Life in the Hill Country: Bee Caves and Blanco TX

March 16, 2011, Cottonwood Creek RV Park.

The other day we decided to take a ride out to Hamilton Pool. We were told about a "good Mexican" restaurant in the city of Bee Cave. We decided to stop for lunch en-route.  However, we got to the restaurant and learned that on Tuesdays they don't open till 5 p.m.  Of course by now, we were hungry and close to downtown.  So, we drove further into Bee Cave looking for a place to eat when we came across this outdoor mall, Hill Country Galleria designed like a city street. In fact the city hall and library are the central building on the street.

We parked and found a nice little pizza shop selling pizza by the slice. After we finished lunch we decided to forget about Hamilton Pool and just spend some time shopping. We shopped and visited the book stores till after 5 p.m. before heading back home to Maggie and Rico.

Yesterday, we drove a few miles to the Historic District of Blanco, TX.  We visited the town last year.  You can read last year's blog here.  In the center of the town square is the impressive old former courthouse built in the late 1800s.

The courthouse was used in the recent movie version of True Grit.

Now the building is a visitor center and contains just a couple of offices on the first floor. The upstairs is vacant and surprisingly open to the public. It contains the old court room used in the movie.

Below is a picture of the old court room converted for use in the movie.

Later we went across the street to a renovated theater and cafe' that is now the Uptown Blanco Restaurant. We had a very good and moderately priced lunch in the beautifully decorated restaurant.

The weather has been mild with a couple of cold days. However lately it's been cool and damp in the mornings with highs in the upper 70's and low 80's. We are patiently waiting for the wild flowers to emerge and bloom.

Blanco, Texas

March 24, 2010. 
We went to bed with some light rain and awoke to the same.  It remained cloudy, foggy and rainy most of the day.


We decided around noon to take a trip to Blanco, Texas about 15 miles from here.  It's a small town with a population of about 1500.  It has a nice historic square around the former courthouse and county seat built in the late 1800s. The county seat has since moved to another town.

We walked around and Joyce checked out all the small shops common in these little shopping districts.  We stopped for lunch at The Red Bud Cafe and had sandwiches.
  

After lunch, we drove to Blanco State Park, a small Texas State Park on the Blanco River.  We stopped at the gate office and went inside.  I asked about the main attraction in this park and was told the park is only a mile long along the Blanco River. The river has some dam walls that the river flows over and folks like to swim here.  The ranger explained that they have RV camping.  I asked about the prices.  A premium site with 50 amps and sewer is $23 plus a daily entrance fee of $3 per person, and in our case another $5 per day for our "extra" vehicle, for a total of $34 a day plus taxes. The only way to avoid the daily entrance fees is to buy a Texas State Parks Pass for $75 for both of us.  The ranger gave us a 10 minute pass to check out the campground.  We took the tour and photographed the river through the drizzling rain.

The campground looked tight with no privacy between sites.  We dropped off our pass on the way out and headed back home in the light rain.


There's a small campground on the edge of town on FM165 called Blanco Settlement on the Blanco River that looked inviting, although it's close to the road, flat and lacked shade trees.  


We like to check out campgrounds in the areas where we stay.  However, we are very happy with our site at Cottonwood Creek RV Park.


We got back home after driving over some rather steep hills on the way home.  The scenery was beautiful but diminished by the foggy rain.


I'm continuing to have problems loading pictures to the blog.  From what I've learned on-line it appears it may be a problem with Google Blogspot that is being worked on.  So bare with me till I'm able to upload pictures!  For now be sure to check out the highlighted hyperlinks above in the blog.