Monday’s forecast was for 100% chance of rain – and it was raining lightly and we decided to go into Groesbeck for breakfast before starting work. We went to a little place – Mary’s Breakfast and Burgers – located off the main drag; another interesting eating place full of locals. You order at the counter and they bring your meal on a plastic plate with plastic ware…..no dishwasher needed. As usual in these sorts of places, the food was good and just enough.
We started work on the Rec Hall in the group area. It is all windows! I think Lois counted 36 but surprisingly only two broken panes to replace. Lots of screens need work though.
Because of the rain, we worked only on the inside. All of the windows and the ceiling fans are now clean, but we still have to do the rafters and lights. In the afternoon Bill and I went to the shop to take the top off an old golf cart. We are going to work out a way to mount it to the Cushman.
Monday night a real widow rattle rolled through about 8PM, lots of lightning and thunder and of course rain too. The family in tents below us left for a while but came back about 9. Sometime after midnight another storm rolled through, but the next few days are to be sunny and seasonably warm.
Tuesday March 9: According to the rain gauge at the office, we had nearly 3 inches of rain from the storms. The lake is rising as the waters from further north in the small creeks and streams flow into the Navasota River. The Navasota is dammed and forms the Fort Parker Lake, the 740 acre lake. By 9 the fishing dock was nearly covered and several of the camp sites were close to being flooded. At noon it was covered and by 3:30 the water was near the top of the bottom railing.
Thursday March 11: Wednesday we took a day off as we are technically ‘on duty’ on Saturday and Sunday as park hosts. In the morning, however, Jon spent 2 hours going around with Dan (Lead Ranger) finding water valves and shutoffs and marking them in the GPS. Later he has to enter all the data so they can find these items or at least get very close to them. In the past they have ‘lost’ shutoffs and had to dig up larger areas to find them. Later we took the long ride to Waco as Lois and Judy need to secure some sewing items. We located the Hobby-Lobby and a couple of other neat places before enjoying a nice Tex-Mex restaurant. One of the finds was a like new pair of Crocks – the real thing – and the right size for Jon. He now joins Niko and Aleskie is wearing them all the time.
The level of the lake has finally gone down, but not back to what it was before all the rain. As you can tell from this ‘after’ picture there is a dramatic difference. Roughly the lake had come up almost three feet. So for the mathematicians out there, how much water was it – figure 740 acres and 3 feet of water???
Thursday we finally finished all our work in the group barracks buildings. They Rec Hall required more screens and it was a bear to clean. It has open rafters and the spider webs and nests were all over. We thought we were done when Judy turned over a bench so Bill could tighten up the legs. Whoa Nelly, lots and lots of spiders. Guess that is where they all fled to as we cleaned. So Judy took the handy dandy sweeper and worked on all the benches too. By the time we finished and returned all the cleaning gear we were ready for another day off!
Saturday March 13: On Thursday the USPS brought a nice package of mail and a phone from Matt. He sent us one of his old AT&T phones so we could activate it and get cell service. So Friday we decided to see what we could do. At first we were just going to make another trip to Waco, but while Judy and Lois were on their morning walk, found a neat little town about 35 miles south that would be on our way to Temple Texas, where I found and AT&T Corporate store. So we headed off for Marlin. Marlin was a big tourist attraction in the middle of the last century for a hot spring mineral well was drilled in the center of town. Now they were not’t looking for a hot spring, just a well, but this warm mineral water flowed out. A pavilion was built and people came from all over to drink and bathe in the waters from the spring. It was said that drinking two cups of this mineral water would ‘thoroughly cleans the body’ and heal many afflictions. The spring is still flowing and the water certainly warm.
We finally did find the AT&T store in Temple, which is a very big city really. Esther (the voice in our GPS) is a bit out of date as they have put in some new highways in the past two years. Anyway, the young lady was very helpful and we are now switched to AT&T. We have our same number and she did transfer in all the numbers too. We are still learning how to use the phone, so if you get a call from us and no one is there, please understand. I did find the instructions on the Internet and downloaded the entire book. This morning printed off a few of the pages so we can know the basics anyway. It’s good to have cell service again.
On the way home from Temple we passed a sausage house in Zibciksville (lots of Germans settled in Texas) and decided to check it out. It was both a retail store for the packing house and a restaurant. The store had all sorts of sausages they make along with some cheese. In wondering about before buying we found packages of Amish noodles…..Mrs. Yoder’s made in Millersburg, OH! Can’t get away from those Ohio Amish!
Saturday afternoon we visited the Confederate Reunion Grounds. It is about 3 miles from Fort Parker and used to be run by the park. It is now operated by the Texas Historical Commission and they’ve put lots of money into it. They have a full time staff of four, where Fort Parker had to take care of it with their normal park staff. It’s an interesting place as it has had three different ‘lives’ and uses over the past 120 years. But that is a story for another day. In the evening we had a campfire and cooked ‘chubbies’ from the sausage house over the fire. It was fun watching all the campers and kids. In the shelters next to us there are several families (looks like all related) with nine little kids under five. By 10 the campground is all quiet with nothing lingering in the air but the smell of dying campfires.
So much for another week at Fort Parker.
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