We left Dallas determined to avoid big cities for a while. Next stop, Fredericksburg TX. We go there most years to stock up on salsa at Rustlin’ Robs and other goodies at the Kuchin Laden and stops at other stores on the street to see if we can find some other way to improve their economy. On our way there this time we made an overnight stop in Luckenbach TX just outside Fredericksburg. Luckinbach is noted for music every night and chickens. We parked the motorhome in the overflow parking lot way in the back to make room for the crowds that never did show up that Tuesday night. We walked down the hill to the dance hall which was not yet open and found the singer set up in the open near the bar,

it was a fine evening with temperatures in the 70’s until the sun began to set. The chickens were everywhere and the roosters were determined to drown out the singer until the sun got low in the sky and they retreated into the trees. After an hour or so of good bluegrass and folk we drifted up to the coach to have dinner thinking we would go back for more music. We never made it back instead we listened to the State of the Union.

In the morning we packed up the little we had set up and drove 10 miles to Fredericksburg RV Park, wondering why we had never stayed there before. It is very convenient. If the weather had been just a bit warmer we would have walked to the shopping. But it was threatening rain and the salsa we were likely to buy would be heavy. We shopped and made some purchases in town and then drove out to Mendelbaum’s Winery on 290 where we tasted some very nice Israeli (!) wines and bought some as well as a couple of bottles of local wine. The Israeli wines are not from the Golan where we tasted wines just three weeks ago. It is interesting that they are labeled “Holy Land” wines. After that, back to the coach for a rest before going to dinner at Cabernet Grill.Tthis lovely place was highly recommended by Deb and Scott and deserved its recommendation. Carol asked if they had vegetarian alternatives and they had a lovely eggplant dish which really pleased her. I had a steak that was nicely seasoned and the sides were also very nice. The desert was over the top, deep fried Pecan pie and Jack Daniels choclate ice cream, if we are going to hell might as well do it in style.

Our plan was to head for Terlingua, just by the west entrance to Big Bend National Park. Checking the weather it appeared we would be better off going to Falcon State Park on Falcon Lake only a 5 or 6 hour drive mostly in the rain. So off we went using lesser roads and driving an extra 50 miles or so to stay well west of San Antonio. For those who have followed us over the years Falcon State Park ought to be familiar. We found this park in 2004 and have been back many times since. I just counted, this is our 7th time in this park. We don’t plan to do much here this time. Take a few walks and bird watch. Chat with neighbors, Maybe take a long day trip to the Lower Rio Grande Valley just because.

Someplace in all of this we booked a trip for August to Croatia, Montenegro, Bosnia & Herzagovina, and Slovenia. We are starting with four days in Tiranna, Albania. We haven’t booked flights yet and we are debating whether to go to Spain or Greece either before or after the tour. The tour is August 4 to 24. We are open to suggestions.

Here we are in Dallas for the second time. We had a delightful time with Deb and Scott at their home. Deb made dinner which we really enjoyed and the wine went very well with it, both the fine California wine with the difficult to remove wax capsule and more local Texas Tempranillo which was a bit thinner and just perfect with the meal.

 Finding our way in Dallas is interesting because the construction project on I 635 impacts travel no matter where one is and ramps that the GPS expects to find open are closed (and vice versa). We found our way “home” easily, just not the way we expected to go.

Sunday we decided to go back in time to our senior year in college, Fall 1963, November 22 to be more precise. A day that found me in the John Hay Library getting in some last minute reading before preparing to go home for Thanksgiving. The word that John F. Kennedy had been shot passed through the reading room, whispered from person to person, each then leaving, leaving books on the table, to go out on College Green to try to understand how our world was being jolted. Classes did not resume and we all left for home early. As I drove with my usual car full west on the NY Thruway  we were stunned to hear on the radio the gunshot that killed Oswald. Almost every car on the road pulled to a stop on the shoulder to try to absorb yet another body blow.

In all the years since then we have never gone to Dealey Plaza to see the Texas Schoolbook Depository, what need? It happened and our visiting the place would not make it “unhappen.” Today we decided it was time to see the very place that our beloved president, the first president we had come to know as adults, was brought down. We waited in line for tickets and picked up our audio guides and rode the elevator to the 6th floor where we joined a throng of visitors going from site to site following the story from JFK’s time in the Senate through his election and the events of the first three years of his presidency. Then we came to the corner where Lee Harvey Oswald set up his shooting nest, it is boxed off now with clear plastic and the boxes of books are arranged as they might have been then. No one recorded their exact position before the investigating officers tore through the place looking for the assassin. Having absorbed the locale we went down to Elm Street and walked to the “grassy knoll” and past the X in the middle of Elm Street where the car was when the fatal bullet struck. Enough! It is history, history we lived through, but it is past and we must continue to go forward into the future.

Our next stop, after lunch in the cafe, was Dallas Contemporary where the exhibit is “Unplayed Notes Museum” Loris Greaud is the installation artist. This is one each person must see for them self. He has filled the entire huge gallery, five large rooms, with the work. I will leave it at that. Here is one shot of one of the galleries:

We finished our touring at the Dallas Museum of Art where I found a curbside parking space and we walked the park which covers the I 35 highway for several blocks in front of the gallery. We could not bring ourselves to go indoors and leave the 70 degree sunshine and thousands of people to look at more art. We walked the park and we sat in the sun before heading to do a little shopping for clothes for Carol and then back to the coach for dinner and quiet time.

I guess you don’t need the rest of the cliche`.

We landed back from our the trip to Israel with extended jet lag as expected and sort of idled around Livingston for several days not making much headway on much of anything. We kept going back over the trip and reliving it day to day in our minds and sometimes talking about it over the dinner table. Mostly we read, newspapers, mail and books. We listened to and watched the news with growing dismay at the direction the world is taking with regard to immigrants and environmental issues.

Finally on Saturday we broke through our lethargy and the rotten chilly wet weather to drive into Houston. We thought to go to the Menil Collection, but we arrived at 10 AM and it doesn’t open until 11. A quick check of Google showed us that the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, had a special exhibit of Monet and the Seine and was open at 10. Whew, that was totally fortuitous. The Monet exhibit is breath taking and it is wonderful to be able to see so many multiples of the same scenes on wall after wall. Unlike the Cathedral, the Water Lilies, and Haystacks these were mostly more modest in size and it was possible to get back and take them in together. We were interested to note that at least two of the grander pieces were on loan from Shelburne Museum, just down the road from my sister in Vermont.

We walked on through the surrealist and contemporary sections and finally admitted that over two hours was it. The legs were tired and the mind was overloaded with fine art, it was time for lunch. We had been looking forward to Kenny & Ziggy’s Deli for a couple of years and off we went to wait in line for New York Deli in Houston. It lived up to the reviews and memory. Excellent Deli food – open face brisket sandwich for me Potato Latke (1) and spinach knish (1) for Carol. We ate too much and were unable to think about another gallery so we found our way to Central Market where we spent too much time and too much money restocking the motorhome pantry. Then we settled in for the long drive back to Livingston and continued with the over long Romance novel we had been listening to since sometime last Fall. We did not finish it in the hour and 20 minutes drive.

The weather continued chilly and wet so we read and talked until it was time to  move on to Dallas. Just before that I noticed a ticking noise from the vicinity of the refrigerator and a quick look showed that the normally placid display was flashing between what appeared to be the interior temperature and an unreadable failure code. I switched the system from “Auto” which chooses electric when available to propane to “LP” and the clicking and flashing stopped. the temperature which had risen some slowly returned to normal levels. A call to the local mobile RV repair produced the promise of a 3 week wait!. I tracked down a mobile RV provider in Dallas who agreed to meet us at Sandy lake RV on Friday morning. The short story is a control box has failed in an “interesting” way and we are waiting for delivery of a new one on Monday. Interesting being a mode the tech, Robert from Blue Moon RV, had not seen. The refrigerator continues to work just fine on propane.

I started a post on the plane to Israel. At the rate I’m going I will finish this on the plane back to the USA.  Our flight over was  uneventful and we arrived to be greeted by Laura Nelson-Levy,  our guide for the duration.  We immediately boarded our van,  helpfully labeled “Hawaii Tours” with Shlomo in the drivers seat.  First stop Tel Aviv, Dan Intercontinental.  It is a lovely hotel with great views of the Mediterranean and some quirky problems,  they canceled our room keys while we were at breakfast preparing to depart and then got huffy about getting one room open.  The grandkids were excited and full of energy.  The first morning we set out for a day of touring in the van and on foot in Tel Aviv.
Our First Stop was the Palmach Museum. This is new since we last came to tour and was a
wonderful introduction to the history of Israel’s founding. We continued to talk about it for the next two days. We returned to the hotel and set out by cab to a restaurant for dinner, Gina in the old train station Tachana.  Up early the next morning and up the coast to Cesarea then inland ending in Safed (spelling variants include Tzfat and Tsefat) at hotel Rimonim.

Tel Aviv was no surprise to me.  It is a large modern seaside city with an interesting history that starts in 1909. We did see some of the old Bauhouse architecture which is preserved. Safed was more of a surprise because most of us had never had a chance to wander and explore on our own beyond the artists quarter. We stayed over Shabbat so we had a quiet day to recover from jet lag and the days of intense touring.  The grandkids were amazing.  They were attentive, mostly, and well behaved, mostly.  We were asking a lot of them and meal times were “interesting” as we were making that part up as we went along and had to accommodate vegetarians and meat eaters as well as kosher,  easier in Israel but not simple. We toured where some would expect, up into the Golan, where saw fortifications and vinyards. We stopped at Golan Winery for a tour and tasting.  Yarden is still the best although we did not get to taste it, we just bought and drank some.

We drove back to Tel Aviv airport for our flight to Eilat.  We stopped along the way at Zippori National Park which is known for its mosaic floors, over 40 of them!  This had opened since our last tour.  It is certainly an interesting and wonderful place with early history and Roman roads. Unfortunately our flight to Eilat was at sunset so by the time we got over the Negev it was dark. We enjoyed a walk to a restaurant near our hotel, it is hard to believe there is only one restaurant serving kosher dairy in Eilat. Our touring day included a walk to the Red Canyon and a drive to a viewpoint on Mt Yoash. It ended with a visit to the Underwater Observatory and Aquarium, not real exciting.  Getting into bathing suits and the hotel pools was exciting.

. . . I am sitting in the coach in Livingston realizing I never did quite finish blogging about the trip. We are still working on images. Mine are mostly family pictures as we have so many Israel pictures from prior trips it didn’t seem interesting to take yet another picture of the Wall or other famous places. Here we are in Eilat at the Camel Ranch:

Okay we knew the date of Chanukah a long time ago. We carry a Chanukia or Chanukah Menorah with us that my sister gave us maybe 50 years ago. So what’s the problem? When we left New Orleans we entered territory where there is no market for Chanukah candles. Not in WalMart, not in any grocery store, for that matter the nearest synagogue is in Houston, 90 miles to our south, a long way to go for some candles and it is too late now anyhow, next up Purim.

We scratched out mutual heads and decided we would be okay if we brought out the menorah and looked at it. That just does not work. What to burn, without burning down the coach. Tea Lights! we bought a lifetime supply several years ago in some junk shop (probably a Christmas Store) for $2. Here is a picture of our dashboard last night, 2nd night of Chanukah:

I promised to write about these gardens, located on Jefferson Island in southern Louisiana. This is one of the five salt dome islands which include nearby Avery Island, the home of Tabasco Sauce and the MciIhenny  Family. Joseph Jefferson bought Jefferson Island with the proceeds of his acting career. Without providing the entire biography, he came from a family of actors and he sought a “property” that he could make his own and tour with. He met Washington Irving and decided that the Rip Van Winkle story would be that property. He made his costume and properties first and then set out to write a script. He produced the show and took it on the road across the country playing to large and happy audiences for years. He became world renowned for his depiction of Rip Van winkle. Eventually he had homes in Massachusetts, Florida and Louisiana. This was his winter home and he loved the view from the front porch.

As usual we refuse to take a major road when a lesser road will do. We left Grand Isle with eight days to drive 700 miles to Livingston TX. We could have driven up to I 10 and stopped in Lafayette, but we have spent time there and wanted to try something less direct so we turned on to LA 24 toward Houma. Again we really didn’t want to stop in Houma and US 90 beckoned, but we turned on to LA 182 through Waterproof LA (never even saw a road sign for it but it is on the map so we must have passed through it). Eventually we were forced on to US 90 as it was the only road going our way. Approaching New Iberia – think about that name in French speaking Cajun country – we located a Passport America campground, half off is always good, at the Iberia Parish Arena.

 seems to be very quiet wherever we have been.

We are still two days from Livingston, well one if we actually wanted to be there sooner and take I 10, probably not going to happen.  We are staying in place at the empty campground while we catch up with laundry and finalize updates to our websites.

Speaking of which, with Dan’s help we have moved both of our websites to a new hosting company, BlueHost.com. Carol has completely redone cgstudio.net with new galleries and new images. I have wiped the cobwebs off goldberg-online.net and added some new links. These are both “works in progress”. I will try to remember to note when I make changes to mine so, if you are interested, you can jump to either of those websites and then follow them back to our blogs. It is a bit messy right now, and I hope to have it cleaned up before we leave for Israel.

Our personal links as of today are:
http://goldberg-online.net
http://cgstudio.net
Xctraveler Blog
Message in a Minute

We made it to Grand Isle and without a reservation we only had a choice of 40 of the 49 sites here. This is not the biggest season on the Gulf. LA 1 bridge may not be the longest in the US but it is clearly the longest in Louisiana. Toll was $9.50 for the coach and car, one way (no return toll). It was built because after Katrina it became clear that the former road would be under water any time there was a major storm, and with rising sea levels it eventually will be under water at high tide. No one in the Louisiana government would attribute this to climate change, that is far too scientific. They are just being practical.

Grand Isle makes Red Bay look like a hotbed of activities. To get anyplace requires a long drive over a two lane road to get to Cutoff, yes that really is the name of the town. There are two parallel roads that run from Larose to the Golden Meadow. One, LA 1, is along the bayou and is lined with small towns and fishing companies and shipyards. The other, LA 3235 a block to the west, is newer and presumably quicker as it doesn’t have traffic lights at every town. We took the old shore road down. What was the hurry? But we will take the newer road north when the time comes, it may be less stressful, with less cross traffic.

Now that we are here it feels restful. Carol is updating her new website almost daily with new pictures. I am doing little projects that somehow have cropped up or been put off because I don;t want to do them.  I have recreated goldberg-online.net  and should be opening it for viewing as soon as I get up the gumption to transfer the domain from Myhosting where it has been since 2002 to BlueHost. Watch for the announcement. In the mean time you can see Carol’s in progress at cgstudio.net (I just asked her permission to post his).

The shore birds are plentiful and I have even gotten some reasonable pictures with the Panasonic DMC -ZS20 20X zoom lens:

 We cannot help but think about the many people we know who are in various stages of fighting for their lives or making adjustments knowing that their time may be near. Just the other day my sister and her husband cancelled a trip to New Zealand and Australia, when her middle son’s mother-in-law was stricken with a burst aneurysm in the brain. That she is still alive and recognizes family seems to be a miracle. May the miracle continue to improve! 

The fog has lifted, it is warm and sunny time to go out and play.

We left Summerdale on Monday the 1st with a plan to stop at Infinity Center at Exit 2 in Mississippi which also encompasses a Welcome Center and Stennis Space Center. We had stopped at this Welcome Center several times passing through and decided that it would be a good time to take time to go on the tour. I also had seen that overnight parking might be possible in a side section of the Welcome Center. We always look for free. The tour got off to an unlikely start as the cash register computer was down and would not reboot to even open the cash drawer. They issued us paid bands and said they hoped the cash register would be working when we came back from the bus tour of the Space Center.

This center was developed in the early ’60’s after Kennedy’s call for landing a man on the moon within the decade. Senator John Stennis saw to it that this site would serve for developing and testing the engines for that project.

 They built a canal to enable the large engines to be transported from there, by barge round Florida to Cape Canaveral – later renamed Cape Kennedy and yet again renamed to Kennedy Space Center at Cape Canaveral. The engines were much too large for any other mode of transport and they could not tested in Florida as there was not a large enough buffer area to make it feasible. The tour is worth a stop if you can allow a couple of hours in your travel schedule. It is no where near as exciting as the the Houston Space Center or Kennedy Space Center tours. The Infinity Center would be a fine break for families with younger children on a road trip looking for an educational event during a long day on the road. Also it would be an interesting stop for nearby locals looking for something different. The center today houses 7 different government agencies and several universities’ space and research departments. Just in the “N”s are NOA, NASA, Naval Research Laboratory and Naval Seals.

It turned out that the signage was clear that overnigitht parking was not permitted and the staff at Infinity confirmed that and one remembered there is a Walmart in Waveland, MS about 15 miles back to the east. That is where we spent the night. Mid morning on Tuesday the 2nd we drove about an hour to French Quarter RV Resort located just 2 blocks north of the French Quarter. It is almost unbelievable that such a nice RV Park is located where it is with I 10 just to the north, I can watch traffic without getting out of my seat, and the French Quarter just two “ugly” blocks to the south. We do not walk back late at night as it does not feel safe to walk through a no man’s land of abandoned public buildings and parking lots in the dark. We have not moved the car since our arrival nor will we until we prepare for departure in the morning.

Our special New Orleans treat yesterday was dinner at Commander’s Palace. This is one of the most highly rated restaurants in a town of highly rated restaurants. We had eaten there only once before, a brunch because that was all that was available on short notice (two days) during our visit. This time the notice was even shorter as I called mid morning and was able to get a table for 2 at 7:30 that evening. To make it really memorable we walked to St Charles St and Canal and followed the St Charles Street trolley tracks to the first Car Stop on St Charles where we got a trolley to ride out to Washington Street where the restaurant is located. We arrived within minutes of our reserved time and were seated immediately. The only complaint of the evening was that Carol’s risotto got gummy as the meal progressed. My osso bucco of lamb was delightful, no there are no Foodie pictures, it looked like beautifully presented food! Naturally the shank of the lamb was vertical. A minor cavil, there was no marrow scoop. Not that I have ever seen one other than in a picture as on this page.

A cab brought us back to FQRV and Geewhiz and a good night’s sleep. Wednesday brought us back into the French Quarter and lunch at Stanley’s. Great oyster poorboy for me and Carol had a delightful salad. We stopped by the French Quarter CVS to pick up a prescription and had a long talk with the not very busy pharmacist about  places to eat and places to visit. His lack of “busy” is due to the location and the very short pharmacy hours, 10 AM to 2 PM daily! We continued to walk through many shops and buy nothing and several galleries where we also bought nothing. Back to the coach before dark. we will have dinner on board and watch a movie.

Tomorrow we are planning on moving to Grand Isle, about as far south as you drive into the gulf in Louisiana.  We will stay a few days and Carol will be able to finish the latest updates to her website and I will work at bringing my website out from under the cobwebs and presenting it in a new “dusted off” version and then I will be able to add some new material. I may even move this blog to it. Watch for the news

Updated 12/6 to include image of Engine Test Stand

We are in Summerdale AL, at Rainbow Plantations Escapee Park. We have picked up mail. We have shopped. We have tried to fix the verdamta (badly spelled German) DVD player and failed causing the possibility of yet more work by a skilled technician rather than a somewhat skilled RVer who still thinks he is young and capable of fixing anything. I won’t regale you with all the details unless someone writes and begs, maybe not even then. Suffice it to say we have over the air (OTA) TV, internet TV and satellite TV when the trees are not in the way. Oh yes we also have cable from time to time when a park makes it available for no extra charge. Who needs one more source?

I must say I am grateful that our miseries are so far limited to the lack of a functioning DVD player and the usual ills of people our age. I sleep fine, just not always in bed during the usual sleeping hours. I fell asleep this after noon, you could blame the turkey and wine, sitting upright on a hassock. I might fall asleep in the middle of a sentence, so I know I am getting the prescribed 8 hours, just not contiguous and well

– where was I?

I am great at keeping Carol awake at night so she too takes advantage of the unintended nap while reading late at night.

The thanks I must give and have not done enough is to my late mother for whom family came first. She insisted we take time to get to know family wherever they were. There were times I really wanted to be with friends, but family obligations always had to be considered. So we see family, second cousins in Fairhope AL and stay very close to Ellie who is now alone, when we are in the same city. When we go to New York we gather with our Ornati cousins because that  is what we do. We also stay in touch with the closer cousins by email and phone. Carol too keeps in touch with her many cousins and is always organizing get togethers when we are near.

Thanks Mom! I know you would be overjoyed to know that we shared Thanksgiving with Joy and family

and that, when we pass through New York City on our way to Israel, we will stop over with Molly for an evening. Oh yes,Sandy and I stay in close touch too, although it is more by phone these days as neither of us seems to ever be in the same place.

More immediately I am grateful for the health and well being of our children and grandchildren.

Yes, I am thankful!