Friends, UMHB, the VA and A Couple of Nights in Belton, Texas…

We are in travel mode so only stayed two days in Belton Texas at the Corps of Engineers Park called Live Oak Ridge Park.  We actually paid for three nights but only stayed two due to incoming severe weather (happily, they refunded us the full third night). The first day we set up camp in site 34 which was on a ridge overlooking Lake Belton. I love the COE Parks as they are nearly always beautifully laid out with very spacious sites. There were no sewer hookups but with really clean, nice shower facilities at the park we had no problem with that.

After we set up we decided to drive over to tour University of Mary Hardin Baylor,  We knew several of our daughter, Katie’s friends who went there to play softball so we thought we would check it out, It is a Division III school so we didn’t expect to see much but boy were we surprised. It is not only MUCH larger than we expected it is a pretty campus and we spent a good hour strolling around admiring it.

Next we drove into town to see downtown Belton. Belton is a quaint older Texas town that is small and more rural than its counterparts, Killeen and Temple. We parked near the town square and walked around a few blocks doing what we like to do in small towns all over the USA. We love to take in the architecture and ponder what life may have been like when some of the buildings were erected. We also found a store I read about which is the oldest family owned department store in Texas called Cochran, Blair & Potts!  It has the classic tin ceiling and wavy, well worn wooden floors dating back into the late 1800’s.

After town touring we stopped in to resupply at our favorite grocery store (H.E.B.) and we are slowly stocking up on goodies we can only purchase there as we know we will leave Texas soon. After returning to our park we called our friends, Jim and Debbie whom we met at Betty’s RV Park and had a little Texas style Betty’s happy hour at our place. It sure was fun seeing them again.

The following day Jim and Debbie picked us up to go to lunch at Schoepf's BBQ in Belton. Not only was it fun to revisit with them, we also had an awesome brisket plate that rivaled anything we had at Lockhart. Man we sure love our Texas BBQ. After lunch we spent most of the rest of the day in a bureaucratic quagmire at the VA Hospital in Temple Texas. I did manage to get my records transferred from Tennessee but only after much frustration mostly because the staff did not seem to understand what we wanted and sent us on pretty much a wild goose chase to accomplish what should have been accomplished in much less time! Anyway, now we know some of the buzz words to use when scheduling my future appointments at the VA so I anticipate an easier time from here on out....

Our next stop will be in Mineral Wells Texas at Lake Mineral Wells State Park where we hope to avoid all or most of the bad weather forecasted in Texas...