OUT OF SEQUENCE...
Today we said our goodbyes to Debbie and Ralph and left Sealy headed towards College Station. It’s been wonderful to just hang out, see family, friends and colleagues and get all the miscellaneous items fixed on the RV.
We both feel like we’ve been eating our way through Texas and have to get out of town before it’s too late! So…what’s our first stop…The Blue Bell Creamery in Brenham because they were closed when we passed through 11 days ago.
BLUE BELL CREAMERY, Brenham, TX
“The creamery” in Brenham has been around since 1907. Sometime in the 1930’s they changed their name to “Blue Bell Creamery” because their Blue Bell products had become so popular. Blue Bell ice cream is known throughout Texas and the southern states. Recently, they had serious safety issues with their production causing at least 3 people to die so they closed down for a period of time. They have not resumed their full operation, including their tours so we settled for visiting their museum and sampling their ice cream.
Neat facts about Blue Bell ice cream:
-They still sell their ice cream in ½ gallons instead of the slightly reduced size.
-All their ice cream is delivered to its destination by Blue Bell employees using Blue Bell trucks.
-From start of production to placing the ice cream containers on the shelf, it’s all Blue Bell employees.
$1 for a scoop of Blue Bell ice cream!
In Texas, you can tell a good restaurant by the number of pickup trucks parked in front of it! Sodolak's Country Inn was awesome and is known for it's Chicken Fried Steak (we shared this one!). They also had T-shirts from fire departments all over the US.
VETERANS PARK & ATHLETIC COMPLEX, College Station, TX
We saw a snippet about this park on either the Texas Bucket List show or the Texas Day Tripper show while at Debbie and Ralph’s. The park commemorates the service of veterans in each of the wars/campaigns throughout our US history beginning with the Revolutionary War.
This park consists of several loops with each loop containing stations summarizing the specific war with a statue of a soldier in the specific uniform of that time period. There are 22 history points with the 22nd about the war on terrorism which does not exist yet.
Strolling through this park is like getting a concise education about our history. Each station consists of a marble block with the campaign/dates, a statue and a sign. The statues are very detailed. The sign has the president in office, the US flag, the medal pattern a soldier would possess if they were involved in the campaign, how many people served and how many died. The Civil War had the greatest number of deaths of any war. The last paragraph of the write up tells you what were the results of each war/campaign.
Many of the stations mentioned places we’ve been such as Vicksburg and Charleston which have more meaning to us now. We read about people whose names we recognized but now we know how they became famous. Teddy Roosevelt and his Rough Riders were in Cuba! The “Halls of Montezuma” refers to a place in Mexico during the Spanish-American War!
VISITING ED AND KATHLEEN, Round Top, TX
We lucked out! We were camping at Lake Somerville, near Round Top Texas where friends Ed and Kathleen are building a second home. Terry worked with Kathleen at Tymshare in Houston years ago. We drove the RV just inside the gate and were met by Ed and Kathleen on their “Mule”, a 4-seater ATV-like vehicle they used to show us around their property. The RV would not have made it. After years of having an outhouse, Kathleen was excited to have a real flushing toilet. I can so relate! They were excited about their beautiful home which was within 2-weeks of completion.
For lunch, Ed and Kathleen took us into Round Top (population 150) to Bistro Napoletana. The food was delicious. The crab cakes are to die for! The company outstanding :-). What was also neat was the bistro used to be Ralph’s (Debbie’s husband) uncle’s “beer joint”! The capstone on the arch over the door had his uncle’s initials H.E.S. for Hilmer E. Schwartz and the year 1873.
Next time...Round Top Festival Institute…In addition to stopping by and seeing Ed and Kathleen, we’ll try to attend a concert at the Round Top Festival Institute. The inside of their concert hall consists of gorgeous carved wood which is acoustical and visually renowned throughout Texas.
GEORGE H. W. BUSH PRESIDENTIAL LIBRARY, College Station, TX
We’ve never seen a presidential library and wanted to know just what exactly they put in one. We’ve passed several we wanted to stop at (Lincoln’s, Clinton’s-it’s glass over a river!) but it didn’t work out. Since we were in College Station we stopped at the George H. W. Bush Presidential Library (older Bush, 41st President not the 43rd President).
As expected, the library walked us through his life, the different jobs and positions he held and the different people and family who influenced him. It reminded us of why we both had a deep respect for him. Prior to attaining office he was a Navy aviator, congressman, ambassador, Directory of the CIA, Vice President, etc. When he sold his oil company, he accepted significantly less money to ensure that all his employees would keep their jobs.
Unexpected items we enjoyed:
-The First Lady’s calendar, day-by-day. It’s neat to see a “normal” day in the life of a First Lady.
-A large section of the Berlin Wall. The western side has graffiti with words of encouragement. The eastern side is void of anything. A stark reminder of that period in history. Did the chunks of the Berlin Wall we saw in Missouri at the Churchill Museum have the same characteristics?
-Funny TV clips of Former President Bush and Former First Lady Barbara Bush dealing with the confusion of having 2 different President Bushes.
Camping: Lake Somerville, Somerville, TX
Electricity, water, dump station, showers