Wednesday, March 21, 2018 - Moving Day; COE Park - Benbrooke Lake @ Holiday, TX; Park Tour; Using the Air Fryer

Wednesday, March 21, 2018 - Moving Day; COE Park - Benbrooke Lake @ Holiday, TX; Park Tour; Using the Air Fryer

Today is moving day.  We have really enjoyed our time here at Mother Neff State Park.  We will definitely return to this campground again, although I'm afraid once folks find out about it, it may be difficult to get a spot.  We were not in a rush this morning since we only have about a three hour drive to a COE Campground at Holiday, TX on Benbrook Lake.  It was a little after 10 before we pulled out.  

What a beautiful day for a drive!  I took a few pictures along the way.

Hamilton County Courthouse in Hamilton, TX - Very impressive.

People can really be creative.  The right side also had vehicles at the same angle as the left side.

Lake Granbury in Granbury, TX

Some people can make "junk" look good!  I love the colors and the way it draws you in.  I'm sure there are really many treasures here!

Neat plane - maybe experimental?

We had a wonderful drive again today and it seemed the time just flew by.  Before we knew it we were making the turn onto Pearl Ranch Road leading to our campground.  As we left the entrance gate and pulled into the campground we saw some of the longest sites we've run across, with covered picnic tables and fire pits.  How nice!  We are in Site #3.  I was shocked how few sites were occupied. When I booked our site there were only 3 sites available in this particular campground.  Looks like it may get really busy in the next couple of days.

We were set up in no time.  I fixed our lunch, leftover hamburgers from Monday, along with the rest of the potato salad we had last night.  Nice to have something simple to fix after being on the road.  After lunch I got to work finishing the blog post from Tuesday.  I don't like being behind.  Now that we are on the road again, there is so much more content to share, and usually quite a few more pictures to go through.  I find that if I go more than a day without getting a post finished its easy to forget details of things we've done, especially if there are two busy days back to back.

About 3:00, Dean suggested we take a drive around the park.  I was shocked at how large it is and how many other campgrounds there are here.  Many of them were right along the water.  Our site is almost as far from the water as it can be.  This is another park we would not hesitate to return to, so there's always the next visit to try one of the other areas.  It is an older park but seems to be well cared for.

We had a great time taking pictures of and watching birds. 

These pelicans were on the water in our section.  They are such great birds to watch.

Adult double-crested cormorants.

Juvenile double-crested cormorants.

A section of the park to stable horses overnight with camping.

A Lone Pelican

Mallard Duck

I'm not sure what type of duck this is - I had to zoom in and it was difficult to get a good shot as he bounced on the waves. 

 As we slowly drove along the water, Dean commented on a huge group of birds up ahead that were congregated together, moving around.  You could tell they had found a school of some type of "fish".  There were pelicans, gulls, and what we believe were double-crested cormorants.  They were all in a frenzy.  I used my new camera today to get some closeups.  We watched and took pictures of a few other birds as well.  What fun!

Feeding Frenzy!

That pelican got one!

Loved the way it looks like the pelican on the right is almost standing on another one while in flight.

Pelican group picture!

While making the drive around the park my daughter called.   We had a wonderful visit with her, and the grandkids Logan and Haleigh.  They have been in Nashville, TN the past few days for Spring Break.  They had the best time and I'm so happy for them.  For those of you who watch "Nashville" you will appreciate this.  They were taking the backstage tour of the Grand Ole Opry when they saw Charles Esten.  He pulled Haleigh out of the crowd and took a picture with her.  Misti said she could hardly take the picture she was shaking so bad.  They loved the Grand Ole Opry where they experienced Chris Janson being inducted into the Opry by Garth Brooks!  It was a great night for them.  There's nothing like hearing the excitement of your kids and grandkids telling you about something fun like this, that they have experienced together!  I'm anxious to see them in a couple off weeks.

After we returned to Bentley, I made french fries for the first time in the Air Fryer and Dean grilled some more hot dogs.  What a great meal.  I loved the fries - they were not oily, browned nicely and tasted great.  Dean's not as crazy about homemade fries as I am but he said they were good.  Best thing - it was an easy meal with an easy cleanup.  Gotta love that!

Our Site #3.

Tomorrow we plan to visit the Stockyard area of Fort Worth.  Stay tuned to see what we find to do.