To The Grandparents House We Went

(You can read that like the "Over the River and Through the Woods" song or Yoda style - whichever.) We went to Giddings, Texas to visit Mark's folks. It's fun for the kids to run around the farm and we all eat way too much while we're there. Boy, can Gramma and Grandpa cook! They send you home with home-grown canned tomatoes and green beans. And Aunt Debbie brings over homemade jelly and pickles. Her pickled carrot sticks are coveted among the family - which is a BIG family. My children are the 18th and 19th of the first cousins. And I'm not telling how many times over I'm a great-aunt.

Father's Day in Bastrop's Lost Pines

Sunday morning we got our over-fed butt's out of bed and went over to the state park in Bastrop, Texas to hike for a couple of hours. "Lost Pines" is a top five example of the work done by the CCC during the depression. The trails are beautiful. With tall pine trees and a fern-laden forest floor, it seems like you are in another world - well, from the West Texas summers I knew as a child, where I'm as tall as the native trees. Lost Pines also has a community pool, golf course, way-cool CCC-built cabins and plenty of tent camping areas. It would be fun to go back and stay there with a big group in the fall, when it's cooler.

BBQ Eight Days A Week in Lockhart?
We haven't worked our way up to eight days a week (like the sign at Black's BBQ - thank you, Beetles) and I don't think you can hike or bike enough to undo that much of Bar-B-Que, but we did manage BBQ two days in row that weekend. Lockhart, Texas is a BBQ Mecca (self-proclaimed BBQ Capital of Texas and for good reason) and not too far off course on our way from San Antonio to Giddings. We went to Smitty's Market for early lunch Saturday and then to Black's Barbeque for late lunch on Sunday after the Lost Pines hike. Both were good, and there are at least two more well-established BBQ joints to hit next time we're through there.

April 23, 2010: In Search of Some Good BBQ

GOING:
Most San Antonio school children had last Friday off for Fiesta's "Battle of Flowers" Parade. We had already paticipated in our share of the ten-day back-to-back Fiesta events and parties, so we packed up the car and headed out of town.

By 1:30-ish we'd found our way to Blanco, Texas and stopped at Riley's Rocking R BBQ and Steakhouse (www.rileysbarbq.com)- just off the main square. The ribs ranked a sauce smile and the homemade Banana Pudding was wicked good.

COMING BACK:
On the way back home (Sunday), we stopped at Cooper's Old Time Pit Bar-B-Que in Llano, Texas (www.coopersbbq.com). I think we were a little too tired from hiking, camping and adventures in Blue Bonnet fields to lug the camera in to the restaurant, which was too bad because the food was just right. You gotta love a place with an outside sign with "Line Forms Here" way before you ever get to the pits to select your meats. Wish there was a way to photograph smell. Smelled VERY good there.

All images on this blog are copyright of Mark Humphries Photography. (click here)