Lost Maples State Park and warmer weather

Texas Red Oaks and a few maple along the East Trail

With San Antonio in our rear view mirror and all that crazy ‘Christmas traffic’ behind us we felt the tension leave our shoulders.  A couple of weeks driving around in big cities had us in need of a nature ‘fix.’  Luckily, there was time for a quick visit to Lost Maples State Park before heading home to West Texas for the holidays.

A late changing Big Tooth Maple with red leaves

Lost Maples was past its ‘peak’ color as that usually occurs in early to mid-November.  But we were pleasantly surprised that it was still so beautiful and colorful.  This was less than a week before Christmas and there were still a few maples with red leaves on them and most of the Texas Red Oaks had turned scarlet red.  A little more fall right before Christmas!

Monkey Rock, a unique limestone formation in the park

Our first night in the park the temperatures dropped into the low 20’s.  However the next morning was sunny and warming up rapidly so we packed a lunch, laced up our hiking boots and went for hike along the East Trail.  Not far into the hike we noticed something that at first glance looked like cotton stuck in the dead stalks of some plants along the trail.  But a little closer examination revealed that it was really frost weed, a plant native to the hill country area of Texas.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Frost Weed

 

Frost weed is not a particularly outstanding or noticeable plant most of the time but the first hard freeze will split the stalk of the plant and the sap bursts out and freezes, often in beautiful shapes.  Although not exactly a rare phenomena, the lovely frost weed ice sculptures aren’t something you see every day.  We felt so lucky that the weather conditions were just right and we had so much fun looking for the little ice sculptures along the trail.  Even Maya got into the act as she discovered that the frost weed “ice” was good to eat!  (We did discourage that activity, not being sure how good the sap would be for her.)  And then, in less than an hour the frost weed ice had disappeared.  Who knows when we will get to see it again?

 

Maya munching on frost weed ice

 

Beautiful oak leaves

 

The rest of our time at Lost Maples was very restorative.  We walked the better part of two days and it felt good after several weeks of not much physical activity.  The days were sunny and the temperatures really warmed up after that first cold night.  It was beginning to feel like the Texas winters we remembered.  We were finally ready for Christmas…

 

Reflections along the Sabinal River

 

 

 

David’s Stats:

Days Hiked   2

Total Miles Hiked   14.78

Ave. Miles per Day      7.39
Total Elevation Gain       1,615
Ave. Elevation Gain per day   802

 

 

 

 

 

Cold Days in Texas...

Maya making up for a lot of lost 'couch time'
as she sleeps off her Thanksgiving turkey...

I haven’t been doing any ‘blogging’ lately as we have been catching up with family, taking care of business, celebrating birthdays and Thanksgiving not to mention trying to stay out of the cold and ice.  Texas is not supposed to have so much cold weather this early!  (David says we could have stayed up north if we had wanted this kind of weather…) But we didn’t want it.

Just before Thanksgiving, West Texas had an ice storm and temperatures into the teens for three days!  Again, not really why we came home.  But we finally thawed out.  Thanksgiving Day warmed up into the 50s and we counted that among our many blessings.  

Since the warranty was almost up on our RV, we made a trip to the Dallas / Ft. Worth area to get the service done and visit with family and friends.  We had planned to stay a week but as this crazy weather would have it - another ice storm was on the way.  We decided to cut our stay short and head south to avoid the ice. Texans do not handle ice well and our method is to try to stay out of it if at all possible.

 

 

Pip is the best cook!

Yummy Swedish meatballs and sausage...

 

 

 

We had a nice invitation from long-time friends, Cindy and John, to camp out on their six acres near San Marcos.  As it turned out we spent a lot of time in their house huddling by the wood stove.  One cold night we were all treated to a ‘Swedish Christmas Dinner’ prepared by our friend Pip who is from Scandinavia.  That got us all in the mood for Christmas!   

The weather warmed a bit and we spent a few days at Guadalupe River State Park north of San Antonio.  We had one last trip to get the electrical connection between the RV and Honda finally fixed.  It seems like we have been having a lot of maintenance work done lately but when you spend so much time on the road, it is really important to be safe. 

 

A visit to the Guenther House is a Christmas tradition

 

The days before Christmas are always so busy and it was good to get to see the few friends we managed to catch this time. We are looking forward to being back in San Antonio and spending a couple of months volunteering at Government Canyon State Natural Area. 

Merry Christmas and see you soon!