Tomorrow was my planned day to head toward hill country
state parks. As a newbie to the
motorized RV world, I’m currently traveling without a dinghy tow. That’s OK for now, as I want to get a feel
for the capability, freedom and constraints of traveling with just 25’ of RV.
Long term I’ll certainly want a day tripping vehicle,
not to mention the capability to pick-up groceries or run other errands without
breaking campsite. But for now I want to
make sure this RV and I are going to have a long term relationship…so far, I
haven’t felt the love.
But traveling without my bicycle, especially in Texas,
is not OK. My bicycle gives me a lot of
capability, in a lot of state parks, to cover ground from the campground to
trailheads and/or multiple hike and bike trails, not to mention bird blinds.
My bicycle rack is the kind where the bicycle hangs
from the arms of the hitch-mounted rack.
This rack worked great on the back of my car. But what I discovered with the Winnebago View
is that the rack is so high off the ground, I must lift my heavy mama-style
bicycle above my shoulder height to put it onto the rack’s arm cradles.
Well, my old neck and back injury allowed me to lift
the bicycle above shoulders just once; and then my body spoke loudly to
me: “This isn’t happening!”
So I got a little frustrated with myself and wasn’t
happy over hauling my bicycle around without taking it off for use. And then it dawned on me: “Hey, I’m in a full hookup luxury site in the
RGV; a site in an RV park with a mailing address. I bet I can order a bike rack
from Amazon and have it delivered to my RV door step!
And so I’ve ordered the same bike rack that I’ve owned
in the past; the kind where the wheels sit in the cradle and a clamp comes down
over the bike’s frame to hold it in place.
Problem solved—I hope.
Penalty? Another lovely week of
birding and biking in the RGV; and carefully rationing my food so I don’t have
to RV to the grocery store.
With order in place yesterday, I rode my bicycle to
Bentsen State Park and had a wonderful 4 hours in the park. The wind picked up by afternoon and so I enjoyed
a quiet rest in the RV, with maps and bird books as my day-dreaming
companions.
But before I develop yesterday’s photos, I wanted to
catch up by posting these Black-necked Stilt photos from my Thanksgiving Day at
Estero Llano Grande.
I see a good number of Black-necked Stilts around the shallows
of Galveston Bay, but none ever let me get close. This beauty seemed to ignore me, as long as I
didn’t try to move ahead of him for better lighting!
It feels pretty good to be a valley girl; especially
knowing I’ll soon be a hill country girl.
And for today, I've got an interesting state park that is only a bike ride away.
You are showing great good sense in ordering the bike rack that you can lift to without any pain! By the way, I saw a Winebago View that had a sage(sorta) green, cream, etc color scheme on the exterior of the motorhome! It was very lovely! Is your new RV in that same color scheme?
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