Abilene, my Abilene...Texas

Paramount Theatre and
Hotel Wooten (tall building)

On Friday, we packed up and left for Abilene State Park near Abilene, Texas. In five hours of driving, we saw almost no towns, very few houses and millions of wildflowers...so many that they put to shame the fields and fields of them we saw around Austin. The Hill Country region of Texas seems to be filled with them. So pretty!

About an hour from our destination the landscape changed. We started seeing even scrubbier bushes and shorter trees and fewer wildflowers...but tons more cactus. The little roads we were on (at 70 mph!!) cut through ranch country though we actually saw precious few cattle. This area and on north is called the Panhandle Plains region of Texas. We set up camp and headed to the TINY town of Tuscola (pop. 742) for groceries. After dinner, we went for a walk and relaxed for the rest of the evening.

On Saturday, we drove to downtown Abilene. We wandered around the deserted streets, but it would seem that nothing really opens here until 10am or so, if it opens at all on Saturdays. Even the visitor center is closed on weekends. In any case, we looked around the historic section and saw the Paramount Theatre and Hotel Wooten, both originally built by H.O. Wooten in the 1930's. Very pretty, though the theater was closed for the weekend, of course, so no tours.

Nonetheless, we drove out to the Verizon store to replace my dead phone and discovered a similarity to all the other Texas cities we've driven near...they are all r.e.a.l.l.y. spread out. Abilene looks like it should only have a population of about 10,000, but instead, it's actually over 117,000!

Sniff, sniff, sniff

An hour later, we drove back into downtown, new phone in hand, ready to see some sights. We started with the National Center for Children's Illustrated Literature, a small center that exhibits original artwork of children's books. We happened on the showing of Dan Yaccarino's illustrations and were pleasantly surprised at how much we enjoyed his work. Oddly, outside on top of a building across the street from this center, we saw a brontosaurus sniffing an orange VW Bug. Hmm. Not sure what to make of that...but it looked funny enough to attract the attention of our camera.

Next, at the recommendation of the museum guy, we had lunch at McKay's Bakery. We both enjoyed the quiche and a tasty pastry (of course). Yum!

We walked to the Center for Contemporary Arts and found a gallery showing of work by Larry Millar. We also found Larry Millar. His work is largely focused on textured abstract paintings using paints made from carbonized wood from the Cretaceous period, as well as muds from various archaeological digs in which he participates. The colors are mostly the vibrant earth tones of the American southwest...brick, soft gray-blue, ocher, green, brown, black, and even orange and white. We had a lovely time perusing the gallery, but really enjoyed it once Larry started picking our brains about which pieces we each liked and describing the techniques he used. We chatted with Larry about his paleontology work and how it has led to his artwork. At some point, Ken asked him about his Navy service. As it turns out, Larry served on the USS Enterprise, which escorted the USS Blue Ridge (on which Ken served), around South America in 1971. Ha! What a small world!

From there, we made our way to Frontier Texas!, a fascinating museum about frontier life in Texas between 1780 and 1880. The exhibits were excellent and well put together. A portion of the museum was devoted to the impact of the buffalo on the people living in the frontier. The Indians, mostly Comanches, Kiowas and Apaches, depended on the vast buffalo herds to survive, using every part of the giant animal for clothing, food, and shelter. The pioneer buffalo hunters just slaughtered the buffaloes for the hides, leaving the corpses to rot in the sun. We learned that a successful buffalo skinner could skin 50-100 buffaloes per day, and there were over 3000 hunters at the peak. Within 5 years (1874-1879), all the buffalo were gone where once the herd was so large that it was estimated at 2 million animals. How sad. There is even evidence that agents of the U.S. government encouraged the wholesale slaughter of the herd in order to weaken the Indian tribes. They were extremely successful. We also heard about the hardships of day to day living, including the loneliness, lawlessness, Indian attacks, and extreme conditions. We read a apt quote that someone had scrawled in charcoal on the door to his abandoned dugout:
Gone Back East to Wife's Family
20 Miles to Water
10 Miles to Wood
6 Inches to Hell
Make Yourself At Home

Ken and 'Barbadilla'

Out in the blazing 95 degree weather, we contemplated where to find a real Texas steak. We were directed to the Perini Ranch Steakhouse in Buffalo Gap, Texas. We were NOT led astray...this place was awesome. Great service, outstanding food and extremely casual decor. Even though we arrived at 5pm, we were lucky to be seated with all the reservations they had. Sitting at a green picnic table with a bare amount of shade from the sweltering sun, we ate a fantastic meal.

Perini Ranch's Jalapeno Bites

We first ordered the jalapeno bites, a signature dish made of grilled jalapeno slices stuffed with cream cheese and wrapped in bacon. Yikes, those things should be illegal they were so delicious. Next, our meals arrived...a 16 oz rib eye steak, cooked to absolute perfection with a side of green chile hominy, and grilled Cajun catfish with a side of zucchini perini. We loved every bite. Yum! Quite possibly the best steak I've ever eaten. We rolled ourselves off the picnic benches and walked back to the car. Outside we found the largest metal armadillo either of us has ever seen...so naturally we took pictures with it.

We finished off the evening with a long walk around the park to work off some of the big dinner. So many families and friends were gathered around fire pits (in 90 degree weather!!) enjoying nature and having a good time. Camping is so much fun!