Art in Marfa Texas…

Ballroom Marfa is a contemporary art museum located in Marfa, a town of less than 2,000 people. Free and open to the public it gives artists and musicians the opportunity to engage with the public. On display while we were there was an art piece by Guadalupe Maravilla who proclaims to be a transdisciplinary visual artist, choreographer, and healer.

The massive piece on display is called Mariposa Relámpago. We stopped by to check it out and it is indeed a “WOW” art piece. This is the ultimate bus conversion, and this piece has a story to it as well. Go to this link to hear what the artist has to say.

Maravilla, the artist, grounds his art in activism and healing and reflects his personal journey of migration, illness, and recovery. At the age of eight, Maravilla fled El Salvador’s civil war immigrated alone to join family in the United States. Recently Maravilla was diagnosed with colon cancer. It was during the recovery process that became interested in ancient methods of healing, including the use of sound.

This art piece, Mariposa Relámpago (translates to Lightning Butterfly) is the artist’s largest sculpture. Each sculpture he creates includes metal gongs intended to create the powers of vibrational sound as a form of healing.

“Maravilla’s artworks also contain a cosmology of potent symbols and objects that connect the artist’s personal journey with ancient practices of the Indigenous Mayan peoples; diverse spiritual and folk beliefs; and contemporary crises of disease, ecology, and war. Mariposa Relámpago functions as a sculpture, shrine and healing instrument.”

“Mariposa Relámpago opened at Ballroom Marfa on November 4, 2023. The installation will be presented at The Contemporary Austin’s Betty and Edward Marcus Sculpture Park at Laguna Gloria in April 2024 and will commence at the Blaffer Art Museum at the University of Houston in November 2024.”

San Angelo to Brownfield Texas…

We sure enjoyed our extended stay in San Angelo even though it was hot and the A/C quit working.  Upon leaving  we continued our trek westerly to Big Spring Texas. We did  find a nice little hike within Big Springs State Park It provided us a bit of elevation to give our legs a good workout as we have been “flatlanders” for quite some time now.

Before we knew it the time came to move on so we continued westward and pulled into a “free” city park in Brownfield, Texas. We arrived before noon and found a very nice site with some shade with 50 amp and water hookups. I said free but there is a donation station where campers can leave a donation to help the city offset costs. Hopefully those who don’t make a donation will at least consider spending some money at the local businesses. to assist the city as a whole.

We found a Chinese Restaurant in town which always had locals inside enjoying the buffet but we preferred ordering from the many choices on the menu. It was fun in that while we waited for our takeout we could see the cook making our meal and he made a point of thanking us for returning because we liked it so much we came back. Also the kolaches at the Donut shop close to our campground  were an awesome breakfast the day we left Brownfield. We only spent a few days but could have stayed longer because we really liked our site. I should mention there is a 5 day maximum stay however.

Another nice feature of this RV Park, besides having 50amp power during this heat, is that it is just across the street from a nice, but long, disc golf course. The course was flat and long with several holes offering some water challenges. One hole it appeared as if Sharon wasn’t quite up to the challenge as I had to find a long stick to fish her errant disc out of a deep creek.

At one hole we were assaulted by a Mississippi Kite who while protecting its nest dive bombed us several times.  I had never experienced this behavior before and thought it was really cool. Sharon, however was a little freaked out as it really came fast and close to the top of our heads! We both regretted later that we didn’t video or photograph this event!

Our second day in Brownfield we decided to make a drive up to Lubbock to play another disc golf course. One cool thing about this park was the horse sculptures on top of a hill on the last hole of the course. Lots of flowers were in bloom and everything was a lush green because of all the rains they have had.

But, wow, this course turned out to be the longest course we have ever played in our lives. There were three holes all of which were longer than 1,000 feet! Normally a long hole is 500 to 600 feet. After logging nearly three miles we ended the day downtown a nice brewery called The Brewery LDK.

Tomorrow is a travel day once again…

NOTE:  We are currently Bernalillo, New Mexico until July 12th…

We had a Blast in Cincinnati… Who Would’ve Thought?

I was so excited when John told me we would be staying in Cincinnati as I love to explore cities. In fact one of my bucket list items is to immerse in city life by living downtown in a big city for a season or at least a month. Our friends John and Jane stopped RVing to live in Cedar Rapids  Iowa and visiting them gave me a taste of what life in the city is like. They live in a loft downtown and walk to EVERYTHING they need such as grocery shopping, doctor visits, hair appointments, restaurants and the gym. Seems like fun to me!

Anyway in researching Cincinnati I discovered a downtown trolley called the Bell Connector. The route was only a little over 3 miles long but went to many of the downtown sites I wanted to visit. I found that the fare is 2 dollars a person and could be purchased in a phone app. Next I grabbed the Downtown Cincinnati app which had several free self guided downtown tours, one of which followed the streetcar route and would point out the interesting architecture along our route. It also had tips for parking locations and I decided the easiest place to park from our RV site would be Findlay Market which is also a stop on the streetcar route.

The North Lot for Findlay Market was easy to find via our GPS and would be only 50 cents an hour with the first hour being FREE! After paying for parking we meandered around east and west Findlay Market which featured fresh produce and craft vendors along with many colorful buildings. Next we found our trolley stop and began our tour. John helped me look ahead at buildings of interest on the architecture app while I paid attention to our next stop which would be Washington Park.

Washington Park features a massive old circa 1800's building now serving as a music hall for the city. It was once a cathedral and is really stunning. The surrounding park has a waterfall and musical fountain which kids enjoy splashing in . It has a huge green space with many inviting chairs and benches beneath large shade trees as well as some civil war history which we also explored.

Back on the trolley our next stop would be Fountain Park which features a huge fountain and a stage for music as well as a huge big screen TV on a bank building which showed a REDS baseball game while we visited. There are many shops and restaurants so we walked the full two blocks all around the square and stopped to visit the Contemporary Art Center which was a free museum of 6 floors featuring interesting art.

 

Back on the trolley we went to the BANKS which houses the Reds baseball park and the Bengals Football Stadium which I definitely wanted to see. While there we also saw the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center and Riverfront Park. The park is expansive and scenic as the impressive 1800's John A. Roebling Suspension Bridge dominates the landscape.

Walking along the river was a blast. We enjoyed the Queen City sign and took pictures of it not really knowing its significance at the time. Later we realized it is the nickname of Cincinnati because during the westward expansion it became the fastest growing city in the west. Thus it was dubbed the Queen of the West or Queen City. The highlight for me was the REDS ballpark! Its courtyard is open to the public, the vibe and the sculptures are fabulous! I loved it.

From the Banks we ventured over to Rock Bottom Brewery for a cold beer before catching the trolley to once more enjoy the murals, the buildings, the parks and the beauty of Cincinnati! What a great day!

NOTE: We are now in Raleigh NC where we will stay for a while as we attend some wedding related functions for our daughter’s upcoming wedding…

A Brilliant Display on Non-Native Plants in Illinois…

We said goodbye to our friends and left Hampton Illinois to head southeast on Interstate 74. We were surprised at how few trucks were on the road this morning and traffic overall was light which made the near 100 mile drive to just outside of Peoria Ill. a pleasurable drive. Did I mention that there is sure a lot of corn growing in Iowa and Illinois?!!!

We pulled into Carl Spindler Marina Campground in East Peoria, Illinois around noon. While in the Midwest we are always watching the forecasted weather and the next three day severe weather forecast looked pretty good so we are here two nights and will move south afterward.

We had a lot of laundry to do so most of our first day was taken up with getting it all done at the onsite laundry  We also needed a few things at the store so a quick trip to Costco to get what we needed took up most of the rest of the day. To end the day we decided to go to happy hour at Granite City Brewing and then we enjoyed the evening at the park.

We had plans to visit Peoria and the sights within the city until we accidentally discovered a really nice boardwalk and trail adjacent to our park. The boardwalk has seen better days but is still in good enough shape for hiking. Stunningly the fields of Purple Loosestrife with a smattering of Yellow Loosestrife and brilliant red Cardinal Flower made for an unexpected showy display in the heart of Illinois.

Purple loosestrife is native to Europe and Asia and was unintentionally introduced to the United States’ Great Lakes through contaminated solid cargo ship ballasts as well as through the deliberate importation of seeds. So as beautiful as it is it is actually an Invasive species and as a result an unwanted plant in our wetlands. Yellow Loosestrife is also a non-native plant from Europe but not nearly as invasive as its purple cousin.

Despite their presence here as unwanted plants they made for quite a spectacular floral display in the wetlands all along the banks of the Illinois River. We ran out of time to explore more of Peoria and will just have to come back another time to see the rest of it…

NOTE: We are now at a COE park near Sullivan Ill and will stop to see friends of ours in Newton Illinois next before moving on to Indiana…

Visiting Friends in Illinois and an Interesting Yarn Sculpture…

We left Cedar Rapids after having such a great time with our friends Jane and John. Next up was a 120 mile drive further east and we pulled into a nice Corps of Engineer Park called Fisherman’s Corner in Hampton Illinois.It was a pleasant drive through the cornfields of Iowa and into Illinois.

No sooner than we had pulled in when Cathy (a friend of ours we met in Bonita Springs Florida) pulled into our driveway to welcome us to Illinois! Yep, the best part of the fulltime RV lifestyle is the fact that we now have more friends than we ever had living our sticks and bricks home. We chatted with Cathy for a while and assured her we would come by their RV later for happy hour!

What fun we had chatting with Cathy and Craig at their RV park! Reconnecting with RV friends is the best! Even better the second day we visited their place (again for happy hour), Cathy’s daughter Salena (who works at a local brewery) brought over samples of the brewery’s beer for us to try. Wow! Two of our favorite things to do… happy hour with friends and sampling new craft beers!

During our stay we also checked out the towns of Moline, Ill, Davenport, IA, East Moline and Rock Island… all part of the Quad Cities. There are several casinos in the area so as newbies we did take take advantage of the new member “perks” by signing up with the new member clubs. As a result we did win a small amount but any win is a good win… Right?

We also visited the small private college in Rock Island, Augustana which had a few really interesting buildings. However, what really caught our eye was a tree we passed while driving through campus that we at first thought had been painted multi-colors. As we parked to walk over to see it up close, we discovered that the tree had been covered in a “tree-sweater” where local knitters and crocheters got together to put a sweater on the tree. very cool… To learn more check out this website.

As our last evening rolled by we headed over to Craig and Cathy’s RV once again for happy hour and we excited to see Marty and Mike. These are friends of Craig and Kathy’s who own a home on a golf course in Bonita Springs whom we met there last winter.  it was a treat to see them again to laugh and share stories! We hope to reunite with these lively folks again in Bonita Springs this winter. I had to borrow the above photos from Cathy because we forgot to take any. Anyway, we had to say our goodbyes because it is time for us to move on a little further east and a little further south to Peoria Illinois, our next destination…

NOTE: We have left Moline Illinois and are near Peoria, Illinois with our next stop planned at a COW park near Sullivan Ill, and then on to friends of ours in Newton Illinois…

Things to Do in and Around Sioux Falls South Dakota…

Leaving the Badlands National Park we headed for a little R&R, (rest and relaxation). We drove over to central South Dakota to a Corps of Engineer Park called Left Trailrace where we stayed two nights. Its a bit off the beaten path as its about a 15-20 minute drive north off of Interstate 90 up the Missouri River Valley onto the Crow Creek Indian Reservation.

It had nice large campsites near the Lake Francis Case in a quiet and very scenic part of South Dakota. Here we simply walked a lot, rested a lot and played a little disc golf. We also used this slowdown to start planning our route further east. There has been no solid plans as we always keep our eyes on the weather when we are in the Midwest and have many alternative plans should the weather turn bad within our path.

We left Fort Thompson SD and drove the rest of the way east on Interstate 90 until we arrived at the Grand Falls Casino RV Resort in Larchwood, IA.  Once the park was within sight our GPS said welcome to Iowa but as we turned into the RV park it said welcome to South Dakota so while the Casino is in Iowa we are still in SD. Funny…

We chose this location in order to check out South Dakota’s largest city, Sioux Falls and our first stop was to visit the park where the town earned its namesake from, Falls Park. There had been a lot of recent rain so the falls were in full force. What a show they put on… There were also some trails in Falls Park winding by some historical mill remains which we also enjoyed.

We needed to do some grocery shopping but as we were shopping we noticed a bunch of tents up in a park. After searching the web we discovered it was the annual Jazz fest and better yet it was free to enter and free to park!!! So we spent the rest of the day chilling in the park and listening to a lot of eclectic (though not jazz) music. What luck we had on this day!

The next day we chose to do a walk to see the sculptures in downtown Sioux Falls SD. Wow, lots and lots of cool sculptures could be found by wandering around the main street in Sioux Falls. There were ballots to vote for the “people’s choice” award and the one that won was not the one I would have picked but it was pretty cool as well. What a beautiful downtown area which was alive and energetic.

That afternoon we headed over to a park to play some Disc Golf. Man it was crowded as there was a tournament also going on. When we talked with some of the participants they told us we could go ahead and play as the tournament couldn’t actually take over the course since it was public. They were all so friendly and helped as we were at a loss at times in locating the next hole on the somewhat challenging course. It was a long but beautiful course and one we were glad we played.

On the way home we stopped at a small arboretum which was a work in progress. it will be spectacular when finished as even in its infancy it was a nice stop. There are big plans for a garden expansion and a wedding area. There we saw a little waterfall and pond,  beautiful trees, flowers and a little leopard frog. Fun!

We ended the day by stopping at the Attic to pick up n order of Chislic, a unique South Dakotan dish made of chunks of beef (sirloin) or lamb/mutton then seasoned and fried. We paired it with some fried jalapeno cheese curds… decadent? Yes, but an outstanding little splurge… Yum, yum!

NOTE: We left Sioux Falls SD and made several one night stops to where we will be today in Cedar Rapids Iowa…