What we miss from Texas

In Texas, people shoot – everywhere – even in the restroom. 🙂 At least that’s how you imagine a Texan, considering all the stories that come to your ears. Is the rumor true? Well, at least many Americans, including most certainly Texans, have a gun. Either at home, in the car or even on himself. Honestly – we can not confirm the rumor and cliché. We’ve seen a lot more “gunslingers” in other states than we have in Texas. Quite the opposite, in fact. Texans are exceedingly friendly and courteously polite.

What we miss from Texas

We miss the great expanses. Texas is a big state. In Texas, they also say, everything is bigger than in the rest of the US. Well, a cliché that we can not confirm so. The pickups are not bigger than elsewhere, neither are the trailers. In return, the Texans are enormously friendly. Yes, the Texans are even really relaxed about it. So not at all what the military-police-Louisiana-Southern redneck told. We were even invited, after only 5 minutes of chatting, to BBQ by a family from Alpine, Texas. This family was just plain great. They adopted two Japanese children when they lived in Japan a few years ago. Both with Down syndrome. The entire family has taken touching care of these two little boys. A cohesion that still moves us to tears today.

Roberta, the lady of the house, asked Claudia before the BBQ what she misses most when traveling. Claudia didn’t have to think long and answered: “I miss the bathtub. Roberta jumped up from the chair, went upstairs and after about 10 minutes came back to the living room, looked at Claudia and told her: “I just cleaned the bathtub and put a towel down. You are welcome to take a bath as long as you like.” Dumbfounded, amazed, speechless, we sat there. Of course Claudia accepted the offer. From a family like the Angles, the whole world population can still learn something. Respect.

In addition, Josh, the son and passionate musician, created our theme music for our videos. Listen in here.

The world is in Texas

Yes really. The world – more precisely cities or state names of the world – are found in Texas. There are cities here named Peru, Holland (Netherlands), Africa, Athens, Wallis (Swiss Canton) and so on. It’s quite fun to drive through Texas and read the town signs. You think, the Navi led us in the error however never to say: “Please turn”.

Big Bend National Park

Big Bend National Park is monstrous. The Rio Grande draws a natural border of 1500 kilometers between the USA and Mexico here. Here you can even just walk across the border into the other country. The river is not wide and not deep. There are even Mexicans who sell souvenirs at the hot springs where the tourists bathe. Fully legal of course. 🙂

In the Big Bend we meet again the two Swiss Debbie and Joel with their Red Troopy. We are together for a few days and laugh and chat a lot. We also drive the Black Gap Road together. This one was really off-road again. Steep, narrow passages, water crossings etc.

The Santa Elena Canyon Trail is also breathtaking. The steep rock walls rise vertically. Now and then a canoe comes towards us on the river. This is another way to get around Big Bend NP. Out here in the wilderness, the nights and starry skies are incredible. Without the smog of lights from a big city, you can see thousands upon thousands of stars. This is what a clear night sky looks like.

Houston – we have no problem

The Space Center in Houston is a MUST. Here is the spaceport and a guided tour is unforgettable. We even have the opportunity to see the next big mission. The Mission to Mars. In a gigantic hall, research is carried out on materials, protective suits, robots, Mars mobiles and much more. We are even allowed to take photos. A look into the future is really exciting.

San Antonio and Seminole Canyon State Park

The city of San Antonio offers something that is usually only known from European cities. A promenade. This promenade – called Riverwalk – runs throughout the city and is the San Antonio River. Here, on the left and right of the river, there are bars, restaurants, cafes to linger and enjoy.

Seminole Canyon State Park is rather small compared to other state parks. What makes this state park special are the cave paintings. Roughly, these paintings are estimated to be around 7000 years old. There are about 200 pictograms on the rocks and despite intensive research, it has not been possible to date to clearly determine from which people these paintings originate. It will probably remain a mystery.

There is one more story I want to tell. We took a guided tour here because of the stories and history of these Indians. There was a woman there with her daughter. They are from north Texas. So still this state that borders Mexico. Then the mother asked the rancher in all seriousness whether it was not dangerous here, so close to the border with Mexico? So, the rancher’s facial expressions were also priceless. How unworldly people can be.

Conclusion

Texas is so big and we have only seen just a fraction of it. But what we saw fascinated us. The aviation museum near San Antonio is also worth a visit. The airfield behind it was founded by two women, sisters, and are even celebrities in the aviation scene. Unfortunately, they were born as pioneers in the wrong century, because at that time everything was still massively patriarchal. So history basically forgets two very important people just because they were women. Here is a link to the Stinson family