San Angelo TX, The Caverns of Sonora, & Mission, TX

     On Wednesday February 3, 2016, we cruised on up to San Angelo, TX to spend a few day with our truly special friends Randy & Retha. As you remember, we stood them up last Fall in NY when they came over to our neck of the woods,  But we had a pretty good reason to be out of town.  Randy and Retha are truly gracious hosts, who love to visit, and enjoy a good meal.  We had to limit our stay to just 3 nights, as we had some reservations waiting for us down in Mission, TX.
     Now, if you check back to our previous visit, we were marooned in San Angelo for 3-4 days because of an ice storm.  Who would think that we would encounter an ice storm in Texas!  Well, no ice storm this year.  Just darn cold weather.  I seem to recall one night, the temps dropped down to 21 degrees!!  I thought Texas was supposed to be a warm, inviting place.  So far, San Angelo is 0-2 in the weather category.  Of course, I had better keep my mouth shut.  You never know what kind of weather Randy and Retha will get when they come to NY next Fall.
     Our hosts didn't let us down though, and soon after a wonderful breakfast, we were on the road heading for a tour of the Caverns of Sonora.

The Caves are privately owned by the Mayfield Family, who are doing a very good job in protecting these natural caverns.  The temperature in the cave is a pretty steady 82 degrees, but the humidity runs about 98%. When you're done walking the last 355 feet up out of the caves, you're perspiring pretty good.  The stalagmites and stalactites near the entrance have died, but shortly after entering, we were soon amazed at the formations below the surface. Some of the passageways are a little narrow but easily passable.

There has been some vandalism inside the caves, and a unique butterfly shape formation was destroyed.  But the 1 1/2 hour tour was well worth the price of admission.
     We had a great visit, got a few repairs down to Big Red, and on Saturday we bid farewell to our hosts and headed south to Mission, TX to begin an earnest search for warmer weather.

     Earlier this winter, I had stumbled onto a blog describing a retirement community in Mission, TX that was building RV sites with casitas and port homes.  They are designed to allow the RV traveler the opportunity to have a little more than a 'campsite", when in Mission, but just lock the door, and you're quickly on your way again. They also offered 3 free nights of camping for coming and looking the place over.  We had to sit through a sales pitch, but there was no pressure, and the program had some definite possibilities.  

 We arrived at Retama Village on Sunday, and were escorted to a lovely site, complete with a 12X24 casita.  The buildings come completely wired and plumbed, but not finished on the inside.  Owners can make them as fancy as they want.  

The Port Homes offer 1 or 2 bedrooms, and the one we visited was about 1100 sq ft.  The 50 foot covered parking space opened up into an outside veranda.  

      Debbie and I both were very impressed with the entire concept.  But the location of this park, and the isolation of being at the southern tip of Texas, was not a location that would work for us. Texas is a darn big state! We also realized that we needed this type of park located near some water.  Other than that, it had just about everything.  If you're looking for a retirement community, follow the link for Bentsen Palms, and drive on down for a visit.  

     Our next stop is South Padre Island, and we arrived there on Wednesday 2/10 at the South Padre Island KOA.  It was a nice easy 80 mile drive over from Mission, TX and we'll be here 12 days.  We're looking forward to some nice warm weather with lots of sunshine.