March 5 - 17 Jasper, Texas
Martin Dies, Jr. State Park
Welcome to Texas – land of pop-up thunderstorms, twist up tornados and springtime pollen!!!!
Our drive from place to place started off with semi-clear skies. Welp – that didn’t last long. Keeping an eye on the weather and thought the storms would have gone past where we were traveling through, but not the case!!! Many times, driving on interstates, it’s easy to get off an exit and sit a storm out. Small two lane back roads are not your friend when the weather turns nasty…… We could see dark clouds forming in front of us and lightning like crazy. Luckily a few miles up the road, we found a small general store with a large, pothole filled parking lot to pull into. There we sat for a while listing to the booming thunder, hoping for no hail….there was a small, covered area where people could pull into to fuel up. We were keeping our eyes on THAT for cover if need be!!! But the weather gods were with us – no hail – but lots of rain and lightning. 30 minutes later we were on our way again – Whew!!!
Jasper, Texas is a very small town with not much around. A few places to get amenities and two antique stores, that’s about it….
The state park itself is large and sits on the banks of the B. A. Steinhagen Lake with two rivers meeting on the outskirts – the Neches and the Angelina. Lots of outdoor opportunities here! We saw a few boats tooling around the river at night next to our site, looking for alligators. Yep they are here but……
As we pulled into our site or should we say “attempted” to, there lies a cute little gray kitty. Awwww…..she wasn’t going anywhere LOL!! She followed us everywhere which made for a difficult time getting into our site and set up. We ascertained from the Camp Hosts that she had been dumped here a while back. Sad…..but anyone who knows us – we have been “cat” people forever. Donna wasn’t going to rest knowing this friendly little being didn’t have a home. Not having any cat food handy, she got some canned chicken – which she quickly gobbled up. Skinny little thing……
On the hunt for a home for the kitty, Mike made MANY phone calls to all kinds of local places. No after No after No – we are full – we don’t take cats, etc. We FINALLLY got lucky and got in touch with a woman who’s been doing cat rescue for over 22 years. Oh, thank goodness!
Off to the local Wal-Mart to get food and a transport cage. We successfully delivered “Silver Belle” to Kathy knowing she’ll be safe and sound with medicine and her shots. We’ve followed up with Kathy several times and Silver Belle seems to be doing okay and…..could be pregnant!! Those sweet babies won’t have to grow up in the woods….mission accomplished and our good deed done….
We had a really great site next to the river. Along with that came LOTS of pollen and bugs…those little black flies almost got the best of us !!!!! We did a lot of hanging out in our outside screened room so we could enjoy the kayaks going by. Mike decided he liked his “screen” hat especially for making those darn good burgers on the grill LOL!!!!
Journey got a boo boo sadly. We came out from the grocery store, and someone had clipped the front end. All in all, not too bad and we’ve scheduled to get it taken care of in a couple of weeks when we’re in a much bigger city. We’re thankful the driver had insurance and so far, knock on wood, the insurance company has been very communicative.
The weather was all over the place, but we were able to get some great bike rides in on the nice days. Trails are always great for viewing whatever might be out there and exercise – LOL!! Watching for…….you know….those crawly things that just might happen upon your path…..luckily we saw none…But we did see lots of flowers in bloom. Nothing like Texas Bluebonnets – they are gorgeous!!
Of course, the day we left, thunderstorms had rolled in overnight, so we delayed our departure slightly as to not be soaking wet all day while driving to our next destination.
Man, those boomers were unreal…. This is a phone screen shot of lightning strikes around us. The blue dot in the center is our campsite. Each red dot is a lightning strike within five minutes, yellow dots are more than 5 minutes old.
A great place and we super enjoyed it…..
