Houston Texas- and a temporary halt

Houston is growing a van community and it is awesome to watch!  Check out the Facebook page-  Texas Vanagons – and join up if you are in Texas!

We started our visit to Houston with a parking lot meetup with new van owner CJ and his dad and the notorious cabinet-man, Abel. (moment of silence for Abel’s’ van, Libby and her engine woes) 

 

 

After some great conversation in the parking lot, we headed in for an introduction to crawdads and  alligator.  

Both were pretty tasty.  But our lips tingled for hours after the spicy crawdads.  I am glad that CJ ordered the “mild” ones for us!  The crawdads seemed like a lot of messy work for a small morsel of meat. But they were tasty. And the alligator……well…..I thought it tasted like chicken!

We spent our first night in Houston at the home of a generous Facebook contact. Jason sent us an invite several weeks ago, and as it turned out he and his family were out of town when we arrived.  He was worried we would rob him blind, but when I explained that we had no space to put all his cool stuff- he said we could use his place!! What a nice and trusting guy, and a lovely home that they are restoring.  Although they are still out of town, we hope to meet them before we leave Houston!

As we were packing to move to another generous driveway offer from CJ, we received word that Mike needed to fly to North Carolina to be with his dad. This tossed us in to a bit of a tizzy as we sorted out travel details for Mike as well as a parking plan for the Geneva and the dogs in the van. Because it would be for almost a week, and there is another cold front moving in, it seemed best to find an RV park for them. Geneva would park and set up with a plan to stay in one place for the week (and weather) ahead.  A nice RV park would offer electricity, propane refill, amenities and shopping. This would allow her and the dogs to sit-tight without imposing on anyone. However, after checking two RV parks it was looking pretty grim and frustration was growing. But we found Northlake RV Park and were pleasantly surprised. Camping on a concrete square is not typical for us.  But the place is nice and offers laundry, wi-fi, a hot tub, rec room, electricity, off-leash dog runs, a fake-lake, and walking distance to a grocery store and bingo parlor!  After dropping off Mike at the airport, I set up camp alone. (whew, that is a lot of work)  The van looks small here and seems to be an oddity among the huge motor homes and fifth wheels. But the dogs are comfortable. (Except I made them take baths at the free dog wash station in the park)

 

 

I am comfortable and I can wait here until Mike returns. Then we will tackle a few of the tourist attractions in Houston and visit some more with the local VW folks before we head for Louisiana and Mississippi.

But for now, I am hanging out here, missing my van driver.