Texas Tidbits; Welcome to Our New Home Town

As many of you have learned by now, Heather and I are moving to Texas soon. Oh, yeah...we're gonna take the kids with us, too. :) Anyway, the question I get from you the reader most often is, "Where are you moving to?" We considered many locations, but the one that kept coming back to us was San Angelo. It's a little "big" for my liking with 92,000 people and I am a small town kind of guy, but other outstanding qualities of the Concho City convinced us that is the place for us at this time. It has great schools (my little girls are 4 & 8), 25 City Parks, One badass State Park, two bigass lakes (the fish will fear me soon enough), great health care, warm and DRY weather which will be perfect for my arthritis and fibromyalgia and enough "big city" amenities, like What-A-Burger (!), H-E-B, Albertsons, Sam's Club, WalMart, etc. the most precious commodity that San Angelo has waiting for us is the friendship of the Funky Old Dude Bob Zeller and his wife of over 50 years, the lovely Ann. Bob and I have been blogging buddies for about a year and developed a very close friendship over that time, so it'll be a pleasure to hug Ann's neck. Oh! And shake Bob's hand. :) I could go on, but I thought instead, that I'd repost something I wrote a while back that has lots of good info on our new home-to-be.

Ladies and gentlemen...I present to you:

The Concho City

San Angelo

If you read more than one post on this blog, then you know that I am a trees and water kind of guy, like in East Texas. For some unknown reason, however, the rugged beauty of the desert has a bit of a mysterious hold on me. I can't explain it, other than to say it's a sort of sagebrush voodoo or something. Segue to San Angelo. San Angelo is one of those places where it's not quite desert and  it's not in the Piney Woods or Big Thicket, I could live there and be happy. It doesn't exactly hurt my feelings that there is a state park and O C Fischer Lake lies within the park and snuggles up right next to the San Angelo city limits. The city got its humble beginnings when after the Civil War, Fort Concho was established as an outpost to protect the flood of settlers heading west to find their fortunes. At one time Fort Concho was home to the Black Cavalry, which the local Native Americans called the "Buffalo Soldiers", earning great respect from the white soldiers they served with and, of course, the Indians. In those days, San Angelo was a trading center for settlers in the area, but as sanangelo.org states "The discovery of oil and gas, the influx of light manufacturing, the initial development of a communications center, the establishment and growth of Angelo State University, and the growth of the medical community provided diversification to a growing community. Today, this city of 90,000 is the trade and services hub of a 13 county area, supported by agriculture, manufacturing, education, business and health services, military, tourism, and retirement." Geographically, San Angelo is almost the bull's eye on the dartboard that is Texas and it ain't far from being a bull's eye on the dart board of places to live.

Texas Tidbits: Lake Whitney State Park

It's the weekend! Years ago, i spent many a weekend at Lake Whitney with my then brother in law, James Jessup. I am sad to say that James died a few years ago, but I carry some great memories with me of the time James, his family (his Dad, brother,etc.) and I spent slaying the crappie at Lake Whitney. I always looked forward to those trips because I knew they meant fishing, cold beer and lots of cooking.

Today, I am going to pass on to you some information about a great place to spend some time with your friends and/or family. Whitney is known for great fishing for sand bass, stripers and crappie. A good place to have as your vacation headquarters is Lake Whitney State Park.With that said, Lake Whitney State Park is not all about just fishing. For example, "Facilities include restrooms with and without showers; picnic sites with and without shade shelters; campsites with water, with and without shade shelters; campsites (pull-through) without shade shelters, with water, electricity, and sewer; campsites (pull-through) with and without shade shelters, with water and electricity (special rates available); an airstrip (2000-foot paved runway - unlighted, unattended, left hand pattern, call traffic on 122.9 MHz); a trailer dump station; a group recreation hall with a kitchen, attic fans, central heating and air-conditioning; a group camp with a dining hall and 8 screened shelters; a Texas State Park Store; a youth group area with fire rings and picnic tables - no drinking water or restrooms near; a fish-cleaning facility; a launching ramp; a playground; and 2 trails of approximately 1 mile each - one for hikers only and one multi-use trail for hikers and bicyclists" See what I mean? There's plenty to do , so can enjoy some fishing early in the morning, take a hike in the afternoon, cook up some good grub and slay the fishi again starting about an hour before sundown.


Lake Whitney is easily accessible from anywhere in the Metroplex and Central texas and it's certainly worth the trip no matter how far you have to drive. After your trip, be sure to let me know how you did while fishing! Have a safe trip!

Texas Tidbits: Lake Fairfield State Park!

The Best Fisherman on Lake Fairfield

I just checked in with accuweather.com and it looks like that all my rowdy friends in the Metroplex and all of North Texas will be having a beautiful weekend for enjoying outdoor activities. There's a State Park just down I-45 from Dallas that is worthy of your attention. Fairfield State Park offers some good amenities spending a day or a week - lakeside camp sites, electricity, lighted fishing pier and more. We'll get back to the fishing pier in a minute.

From the Park website, here's a 3 minute video, that gives you some great information about Lake Fairfield and all the stuff you can look forward to when you visit. Another good thing about Lake Fairfield is that is a power plant lake, so the water of the lake stays warm even during the coldest of times. Another cool thing is that there are freshwater redfish in them thar waters. Redfish are a saltwater species but they were bred to adapt the to fresh water of Lake Fairfield. let me tell you that when you latch onto one of those big bad boys, you know that you have something at the other end of your fishing line. As a matter of fact, a good size redfish on the business end of your line feels somewhat like trying to haul in a compact automobile. And they taste GREAT when cooked properly. This is where the lighted fishing pier comes into play. Besides redfish, you can catch bass, crappie and catfish as well as panfish like bream.

To me, a park like Fairfield is all about the fishing, but for some reason unknown to the brightest minds in this room (that would be me), some of you are heathens and don't like to fish. I call you "heathens" with love in my heart.  :) There are other things to do besides fishing for you heathens that don't fish, again I say that with love in heart, like "A six-mile trail has connected an older 9-mile trail to provide a continuous 15 miles of trailways that provide multi-use (hiking, mountain biking, and equestrian) access from one end of the park to the other. Much of the trail is adjacent to the 2400-acre Fairfield Lake. There is also a 2-mile nature trail and 1 mile of bird watching trail." Attention Bob Zeller of Texas Tweeties! There's birding at Fairfield State Park!

The park is about halfway between Dallas and Huntsville and if my math and memory serve me well, that's about 85 miles or so from the Big D. It's well worth the drive just to escape the Rat Race, which by the way, the rats are winning, to Fairfield for the peace and quiet of a relaxing weekend of doing what the hell ever you feel like doing, even if it's nothing.

Texas Tidbits : Pedernales Falls State Park

   I am a Texan. I love all that is Texas - all 267,000 square miles of, as John Wayne said, "The damnedest lady you ever saw". Having said that, over time you'll notice through my posts that I am particularly fond of the Hill Country and East Texas. Why? Two words : Trees. Water. Today, it's the Hill Country.
   Texas offers unlimited vacation destinations and choosing just one is often quite a chore. On the other hand, with so many places to choose from, it's extremely hard to go wrong. Case in point, Pedernales Falls State Park. Trust me on this. You'll want to take 3 1/2 minutes to view this video. Score one for "the damnedest lady you ever saw".

UPDATE : If you haven't done so yet, get your FREE Texas Travel Guide here. I have been getting them since 1990. They're outstanding. And FREE.