Saturday, April 9th – Dallas to Waco, Texas – Day 60
An early wake up was necessary as we needed to get Mary to the airport for a 10:30am flight. The trailer was packed up but no breakfast was served. On the way Gen started to get Mary checked in to her flight and realized that she had to do an online vaccination verification confirmation. This resulted in a small amount of panic since Mary’s cell phone is not the most modern and we couldn’t find information we needed. This process continued until we were in front of the woman trying to check us in who said she couldn’t until the vaccination was verified. Things were tense but like most things do, everything worked out in the end.
As we drove off, we realized a huge part of the trip was over. As a group, Gen, Mary, Aisling, Charlotte, John, and myself had a lot of wonderful experiences throughout the south-east United States that will be talked about for a long time. The kids kept asking about Grandma, especially John.
We still needed to find something for breakfast as we started to move towards Waco, Texas. Everywhere we have travelled we kept seeing Waffle House with their yellow sign and simple font. We decided that this might be an opportunity to check it out. It was okay. Cheap breakfast but I expected more from the waffles. I also had wanted fried chicken and waffles because I’ve heard so much about it but never tried it. They didn’t have it which was disappointing.
The drive to Waco was only two hours. We had set our sights on another National Park, Woolly Mammoth National Park. When we arrived as we purchased our tickets, the kids dug up mammoth bones in the sandbox provided. They really enjoyed it. There was some skeletons, bones and plastic animal scat on display that you could check out.
We started down the path to the exhibit while completing junior ranger books. There was a total of one building on site. A long time ago, the area was wetlands and this heard of Mammoth wandered in to get a drink when, they believe, a flash flood killed them all. They determined that the animals were covered in water when they died. Beside the building, they found 14 (don’t quote me on that number but a large amount) skeletons of mammoths of different sizes. When they had removed all the bones and were filling in the pit, they found more bones. They excavated, but presumably ran out of money, and the site became a State Park and then a National Park.
Inside the building were the remains of several mammoths and the remains of a camel – all partially excavated. They had signs to tell people about what they were looking at, the process for preservation and the careers associated with it.
We exited the building expecting more but the path led back to the parking lot. We ate lunch, completed junior ranger booklets, performed some light shopping and shot a video wishing my 40 year old brother Darren a happy birthday.
Genevieve had found out that Waco was in McLennan County. Since Gen, Aisling, Charlotte and John are all McLennan’s, we decided to go see the town and take some pictures to celebrate their namesake. We had already seen McDonough Georgia and now the McLennans were in the spotlight. We found a beautiful, but faded, court house and settled in to take some pictures. After we completed some light shopping to further commemorate our McLennan experience, we headed towards where we were staying.
The Harvest Host we were staying at was Walker Honey Farm and Dancing Bee Winery. Each Harvest Host gives a different experience, some give you nothing except a cheap and convenient place to stay, some give experiences like milking a goat, or friendly conversation and a beautiful property like Millwood Flower Farm. Walker Honey Farm and Dancing Bee Winery provided a fantastic experience for our money. We arrived and they offered us a free wine tasting of their house meads, wines and spirits with a charcuterie including gouda and brie cheeses (for a discounted price). For $42, we received, the wine tasting, charcuterie, a night’s stay in a lovely field (albeit with a train and a highway nearby), 7.5 pounds of local pure honey, and a beautiful bottle, plus the kids got to see some bees.
I made a delicious lentil dal for dinner. Even the kids ate it so I know it must have been good. We then played baseball. Charlotte had just gotten a new glove and she was keen to try it out. Aisling hit the ball well and loved running the make-believe bases.
The wind was intense, and the trailer was starting to move back and forth during the night. We opened the windows to allow as much air as possible to move through, so we weren’t catching the wind.
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