We left you in our last post at Chickasaw National Recreation Area in Oklahoma.  The cold weather and rain was not very Spring Break like and we cancelled our second night at Chickasaw and decided to head South towards Texas, visited some Waco Mammoths, our favorite Texas fast food, and a little beaver on the way, and lucked into a wonderful spot near Austin. 

11 March 2019 – Chickasaw Natl Rec Area to McKinney Falls State Park, with a stop at Waco Mammoth National Monument

We got out of Chickasaw National Recreation Area mid-morning, in attempt to avoid peak DFW traffic (good luck, right?).  We were craving some Whataburger and found one near Texas Motor Speedway.  We also needed fuel and the Whataburger happened to be walking distance to a Buc-ee’s.  Everyone says they’re great, so it seemed to be a perfect lunch stop.

Wow!  Buc-ee’s is wild.  I really enjoy the immense number of fuel pumps and all have diesel.  The store inside had such a variety and everything inside and out was so clean.  The crowd was staggering, but they are equipped for you and 1000 of your neighbors.  We’re fans now and looked for them when we needed fuel for the rest of the trip.

After a quick fill up and some slushies, we hiked over to Whataburger to get a little more Texas flowing through our veins.

 

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Waco Mammoth National Monument

Our trip through the DFW traffic mess wasn’t terrible.  Just a few folks that don’t realize the rig isn’t going to stop on a dime and some construction slow downs.  The traffic stayed pretty thick down to Waco.  We made a quick detour to visit the Waco Mammoth National Monument.

 

Waco National Monument is a relatively new addition to the National Park Service system.  Several fossilized Columbian mammoths (they stood over 14′, way bigger than woolly mammoths) were discovered on this site in 1978.  The site also has other fossils from the period, saber cat and a camel.  Baylor University continues to excavate the site and who knows what else they can find.

To tour the monument, unless you are a BIG Columbian mammoth fan, you only need about 2 hours.  There is a small admission fee (NPS passes don’t apply) to go into the dig site.  There are tours that start every 30 minutes.  You could cruise through without listening to the tour, but it was worth hearing the details from the guide.

 

The kids finished up their Junior Ranger badges and we were back on the road.

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Waco to Austin

 

Since we left Oklahoma a day early, we didn’t have a place in mind to stay for the night, but we have some friends in Austin.  They were available for a visit, so Austin became the target destination.  We aren’t against spending the night in Wal-Mart National Park, but scenery is better.  We lucked out finding a spot (someone cancelled and that spot was the only one open for a week) at McKinney Falls State Park, on the southeast side of Austin.

We rolled into McKinney Falls around 5 pm.  First off, what a gem.  There are so many great National Park units across the country, but we are even more surprised with how great State Parks are everywhere we go.  We didn’t plan on spending any time exploring McKinney, just staying the night.  However, after our drive to the campground, our agenda for 12 March, just filled up a bit more.  We set up Patty the trailer quickly so we weren’t trying to hook up water in the dark when we came back from dinner.

We met our friends and had a great dinner.  Venison tacos, charro beans, and rice and capped with some Blue Bell ice cream.  If that’s not Texas.  The kids hadn’t seen each other in awhile and had to get to know each other again, but by the end of the night no one wanted to leave…kids or parents.  Thanks for a great night Thomas family!  Can’t wait to run into you out on the road soon!

 

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12 March 2019 – Waking up and Exploring McKinney Falls State Park

We woke up to a cool, but thankfully dry morning in McKinney Falls State Park.  This park was a pleasant surprise.    I’ll do a separate review later, but this place was wonderful.  We had a spacious, beautiful, and quiet campsite.  The campground is a selling point, but the main attraction is the falls.  Because it was chilly again, we drove instead of biked or hiked to the falls, but the trail system was well kept and went by all of the points of interest in the park.  The falls were another great swimming hole that we didn’t get to try out (the other being Little Niagara Falls at Chickasaw National Recreation Area).

 

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After some wandering around, we packed up the trailer to keep heading to our final destination, San Antonio.  Next time we’ll pick up heading over to Lyndon B. Johnson National Historical Park.  Thanks for reading.

 

-See you out there,

Part-Time Paradise