BGE Enhancements

So last weekend it rained so we had some time on our hands for some projects that seemed to be constantly pushed onto the back burner. One of them was building an extension bench to the BGE stand. We had all of the components, just needed to actually make it!

Here it is in the "down" position.

And da-da! In all of it's glory in the "up" position.

As you can see it really enhances the space that MM has to place cutting boards, pots, lids etc. The extension is made from the same wood as the existing table and it was lovingly stained (by me!) so it will weather to be the same colour. The brackets lock in place so there shouldn't be any accidents.

Not bad if I do say so myself :)

Camping - Stephen F Austin State Park

So before it gets hot, humid and the mozzies arrive, we decided to get a bit of camping in. Apparently so did the rest of Houston. It took me 2 days to find a park with availability and even then it had a 2 night minimum! Texans take their camping seriously it turns out!!

So, we packed up the car with our camping gear, bikes and fishing rod and head about an hour's drive south west to the Stephen F Austin State Park. The park is on land granted to Mr Austin, the "Father of Texas", from the Mexican's for the first Anglo colony in Texas. Who knew!?

The camp ground was great. They separate the RV's from the tents and each site has a water tap and fire pit. We put the fire pit to good use:

On the second night we really got that fire going!

It seems MM is a bit of a fire bug ..

The camp ground is bordered on one side by the Brazos River. Victoria might have the 'Mighty Murray' but I think the 'Brazos Beast' has gotten it beat! Usually you can fish here but the river was up on it's banks and moving rather swiftly so the fishing rods stayed in the car. No catfish for us.
We did go for 2 hikes and blew the cob webs of the bikes for a couple of rides. At Stephen F Austin we saw a host of birds - cardinals, woodpeckers, vultures, hawks, wrens, ravens - along with 5 white tailed deer.

On one of the days we also took a side trip to the nearby Attwater Prairie Chicken National Wildlife Refuge. We rode our bikes around the center, which include numerous cattle grates which was interesting, until MM got a tyre puncture. Luckily we were close to the car because the tools were were carrying couldn't fix it.

Although we didn't see the Prairie Chicken, we did spot white tailed hawks, ducks, scissor tailed flycatcher and the highlight of the day for me - a crested caracaras. :)