Port Lavaca/Indianola, Texas

The motorhome is parked at Mary’s home in Murphys, California. She is busy with personal matters. She departs with her 14-year-old grandson for a trip to Turkey this Wednesday.

In other news…

Seven days ago I got my Ford Bronco II back after a transmission rebuild. It seems to run fine. However as part of the 3 year, 50,000 mile warranty, they require to re-inspect the vehicle after two weeks. So I’ll return to the transmission shop on Monday, April 21st. During the next few days, I’ll be busy with routine maintenance and cleaning on both the Bronco and motorhome. My actual departure date will be determined by the receipt of the telephone call discussed below.

Last September during my eye exam at the Seattle, Washington VA Hospital I was told I have a large cataract in my right eye that should be attended to in the next year.

On March 24th, we drove the Bronco 104 miles (one way) to the VA Medical Center at Livermore, California for my new eye exam which confirmed my cataract in my right eye. I was told I’m a candidate for surgery. I now await a phone call to establish an appointment for a consultation with an eye surgeon.

During my eye exam I was told that the surgery would be performed at the large Palo Alto facility near San Francisco. Just like being in the military, I am now standing in line and waiting! 🙂

A more relaxed mode..

After our 682 day on-the-go 2011-2013 circumnavigation of the United States, we have decided to slip into a more relaxed mode. In the next few months we will be traveling through areas previously explored. Unless we do something unusual, this Blog will feature a photo album from the circumnavigation and will change daily.

To read about today’s photo album location, click this link… http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indianola,_Texas

CLICK ON THE BELOW PHOTO. ONCE YOU ARRIVE AT THE PHOTO ALBUM, SIMPLY CLICK “SLIDESHOW” AND ENJOY!

Port Lavaca/Indianola, Texas

I HOPE YOU ENJOYED THE PHOTOS.

Yesterday was a sunny day at 75 degrees. Forecast for today is a sunny day at 77 degrees.

Enjoying nice weather is another joy in the life of a full-time RVer!

The red dot on the below map shows our approximate location in the State of California. You may double left-click the map to make it larger…

Enjoying 65-75 degree temperatures with low humidity most of the year is a primary joy in the RVing lifestyle!

“Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance you must keep moving”…Albert Einstein

On October 27, 2012, I created a two-minute video titled America The Beautiful. The music America The Beautiful is by Christopher W. French. The photos, which I randomly selected, are from the states of Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Mississippi, Montana, New Mexico, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Texas, Tennessee, Washington and West Virginia (not shown in that order)…are mine. Yup, That’s me standing in front of the Post Office in Luckenbach, Texas…Y’all!

Click this link to start the video. Make sure you have your speakers turned on and go to full screen asap.
http://youtu.be/FfZUzEB4rM8

If you would like to see my YouTube videos, click this link… http://www.youtube.com/user/JimJ1579/videos

There are more than 500 photo albums in my Picasa Web Albums File. To gain access, you simply have to click this link… https://picasaweb.google.com/jimjrver

If you have not checked out my Ramblin Man’s Photos Blog, you can do so by clicking this link…http://ramblinmanphotos.wordpress.com/

For more information about my books, click this link:
http://www.lulu.com/spotlight/panamaorbust

All original material Copyright – Jim Jaillet 2014

PORT LAVACA, TEXAS

I love small local museums because they are bound to have something you’ve never seen nor will ever see again. Aha!  This broken clay pot is a weapon. The shrapnel balls were put in a similar pot with boiling oil and set on fire.  When tossed aboard an offending boat, the sailors would try to put the fire out, the oil would spread fire everywhere and the cold water would hit the shrapnel ball, explode it and kill anyone near it. Amazing.

This painting by Frances Kruse shows how the local natives lived before the white man forced them inland.

This buffalo head is as close as I want to be to one of the handsome beasts. A folk story here tells of a soldier wounding a buffalo. The Padre with him got its attention so the soldier could reload his musket. The chase was on. The buffalo trampled the Padre and walked off. Both lived through the encounter.

Oyster shellers worked near a window so they could throw the shells outside into the water. They eventually figured out how to use oyster shells to make roads.

These outrageous hats were obviously the cat’s meow, but I found them pretty funny. It’s hard to imagine wearing one of these toppers.

From the museum, we went to the Port Lavaca Bird Sanctuary. Another walkway around a marsh. The birds avoided being close to the walk way. The marsh vegetation here gives no cover.

Even so, I got some fuzzy pictures. This one looks like an ibis but I looked up birds with grey/black beaks and never could identify this bird.

This one is definitely an ibis.

And, a couple of hungry roseate spoon bills.

At the water frontage, a beautiful snowy egret. We learned that one female shrimp lays over a million eggs that hatch within 24 hours. No wonder they all come here to fuel up for their long flight north.

We took a pleasant drive to Indianola and cruised Magnolia Beach. There are many hurricane houses here. The town was completely wiped out by hurricanes twice. They build smarter but is it smart to build here?

Close to shore a congregation of birds gathered on an old dock, three of them black cormorants. In the water were porpoises swimming close by.

We just can’t seem to get enough of the birds around here. We drove to another bird sanctuary.

Indianola has a working fishing fleet. All the boats were out. The town ends  at the water’s edge and here was this picture postcard view nearby.

A  pelican flew in and  decided to sit right where we could take pictures of  him.

A guy at the bar told us of another bird sanctuary and off we went. We tried and tried to get a good picture of this huge bird. We thought at first it was a whooper. But, no. Another type of egret. All in all, a lovely day with good weather.

Port Lavaca, Texas – Day 2

The motorhome is parked at VFW Post #4403. We will depart here later this morning.

Yesterday we took the Bronco on a day trip of about 30 miles. First stop in Port Lavaca was the Calhoun County Museum and then to a bird walk sanctuary. Back to the motorhome for lunch then we drove about 10 miles south to the ghost town of Indianola.

You can read about Port Lavaca by clicking this Wikipedia link…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Port_Lavaca,_Texas

You can read about Indianola by clicking this Wikipedia link…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indianola,_Texas

Here are some of the photos I took yesterday…

As always you may left click upon an image to see an enlarged view and then click once again to see an even larger view…

There is a really interesting historical story associated with this area of the Texas Coast. In 1687 the French Explorer La Salle lost all his ships during his exploration. A few years back the wreckage of the La Belle was found and more than 1,000,000 artifacts identified. To read this very interesting story, simply click this link…
http://www.texasbeyondhistory.net/belle/index.html

Enjoying interesting old cities/towns is another joy of the full-time RVing lifestyle!!!

Here’s a Google Earth image of our location. The V marks the location of the VFW Post., I locates Indianola and X marks the location of the La Belle wreckage,,,

The red dot on the below map shows our approximate location in the State of Texas. You may double left-click the map to make it larger…(look closely on the Texas coast…)

Enjoying 65-75 degree temperatures most of the year is a primary joy in the RVing lifestyle!

“Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance you must keep moving”…Albert Einstein

If you have not checked out my Ramblin Man’s Photos Blog, you can do so by clicking this link…
http://ramblinmanphotos.wordpress.com/

All original material Copyright – Jim Jaillet 2013
For more information about my three books, click this link:
http://www.lulu.com/spotlight/panamaorbust