More of early February in the Rio Grande Valley of Texas

La Feria, TX - 77º and bright sunshine, mild wind.  Started out morning with misty fog very heavy but turned into a nice day.  Just got back from Gatti's Pizza in Harlingen where about 70 people showed up for Bingo and pizza/spaghetti, and a lot of visiting.

 Week ago yesterday we went to Laguna Atascosa WLR (Click Here) after church, taking Harold & LaRhoada Neher, for the 1 pm 1.5 hour tram ride.  Laguna Atascosa National Wildlife Refuge has an impressive 417 species of birds, 45 mammals, 44 kinds of reptiles, 130 butterfly and 450 plant species. It is located in deep South Texas, which is considered to be one of the most biologically diverse regions in North America.

 We didn't see all the species of wildlife, but got acquainted with their habitat, etc.
It was pleasant day for temperature, but very windy and when the sun went under clouds for a while it was a bit chilly.

 We got to see the Crested Caracara bird (Click on link)

Phyllis with our guide and the Neher's as we were ready to leave.

 This last Saturday morning we helped with the "Egg in a bag" breakfast.  Each party got to put what ham, onions, mushrooms, tomatoes, green peppers, sausage in a zip-lock bag; then requested one or two eggs and the ladies put that many scrambled eggs in the bag.  It had the customer's name on the bag.  These were then put in boiling water in big pots until cooked.

This photo was taken when we first tested them out.  As we got going, we had as many as 6 or 8 bags in each pot and it took quite a while to run through the 40-some servings.

Pat Sumner "stood the heat" for the 40 some minutes as they all cooked.
They also had access to biscuits,  gravy, orange juice, coffee, sausage.  All were happy with it.

On Friday we drove north some 100 miles to Kingsville, Texas and toured the King Ranch just to the west of Kingsville.  Took the 10 am bus tour.  The weather was heavy overcast and cool and it kept some of the wildlife back from being seen, but was a good tour.  Phyllis and I have probably taken the tour some 6 times and is always interesting.  Jan & Lynn had never been there before and think they enjoyed.

Some of the "token" longhorns kept around for show.

  King Ranch  (Click for website)
These are some of the Santa Gertrudis cattle, which was developed as a new breed The first and perhaps the most enduring efforts to produce the rugged breed began in 1910 when the King Ranch decided to systematically crossbreed its Shorthorn and Hereford cattle with Brahman.They are on some 825,000 acres of its home ranches in South Texas where they are bred, calved, raised, fed to slaughter.

Horses used to be a priority on the ranch,  producing 1946 Triple Crown winner ASSAULT and 1950 Kentucky Derby and Belmont Stakes winner.  Believe most of the horses on the place now are used by the Los Kineños – King’s cowboys.

We didn't see any first-hand, but there are many rattle snakes in the area.

After touring the Ranch we ate at Big House Hamburger in Kingsville and then went to the King Ranch Museum and also the King Ranch store downtown.  After the 100 mile drive back to Harlingen we celebrated Jan's 56th birthday by eating at The Longhorn Cattle Company Barbeque & Steak Restaurant. 

At right is Pat Steckelberg and Lynn Freye.

 

At left is Lynn Freye, Jan Freye and Phyllis Miles.

     At right is Phyllis Miles and Lynn Miles.

More later, Lynn