Texas Bucket List

Texas Bucket List

Simmons Bank

The Texas Bucket List – Veldhuizen Cheese Farm in Dublin

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Dublin – The cattle industry in the Lone Star State is big business.  From the plains to the valley, we’ve seen all sorts of livestock is all sorts of settings and when we pulled into the Veldhuizen Farm in Dublin, it’s safe to say we found some of the happiest cows we have ever come across. Stuart Veldhuizen takes good care of his cattle because they provide him and his family with lots of cheese.

“We really disturb them very little,” Stuart said. “The only time we really mess with them is milking, which is twice a day, so we really don’t mess with them a lot, they’re just curious as ever it’s like, what are you doing out here today? And so they just come up.”

Stuart isn’t exactly from around here.

“I say I got delivered out in Minnesota, brought to Texas, it’s where I’m supposed to be,” Stuart said.

His journey to the Lone Star State started in the early 90’s when the former diary farmer’s father found a magazine article about making milk in the most beautiful place in the whole world.

“My dad actually read an article about a Texas dairy and he showed me pictures and there was cows on green grass in December,” Stuart said. “And when you live in that world you think, how can that be? A dairy where there’s green grass in December?”

Their venture only lasted until 1996 when Stuart decided that making milk wasn’t for him, but after working off the farm for a few years he started to yearn for another adventure in agriculture. This time, he wanted to be the big cheese.

“Doing some research and found that raw milk cheeses looked like the up and coming thing, ended up deciding to do it,” Stuart said.

With the help of his wife, Connie, his daughters, Chelsea and Rachel, and Stuart’s dad, Veldhuizen cheese got off the ground.  To make the artisan cheese different from the rest, his daughter Chelsea had the bright idea of adding sheep to the mix.

“This is the only dairy in Texas that has sheep,” Stuart said. “I’m sure there’s a little bit around, more in Europe where there’s maybe some blends. There’s maybe a little in the U.S. but nothing in Texas.”

Stuart and four generations of his family got to milking and making all sorts of raw milk cheese.

“It’s just a beautiful … flavors of the cow side, and amazing flavors of the sheep side,” Stuart said.

One of the biggest differences with this cheese is the fact it’s raw milk which means it’s not processed.  In other words, you won’t find any yellow cheese here.

“Raw cheese means that it never gets warmer than the temperature of the cow during the whole cheese making process,” Stuart said. “So with most cheese that people are used to, they first pasteurize the milk at 181 degrees for 30 seconds, cool it back down to 89 to 90 degrees, do the cheese making process. What we do is we start with our milk at 89 degrees with our cheese making and it’ll only get up to 100 to 102. We never get it above that mark, so it’s raw milk cheese. So we don’t change the structure of the cheese, we keep all this natural flora that’s in our milk that gets passed on into the cheese. And so this’ll be run through the Cheddar mill and we will add salt to it and some beer today and we’ll mix all this in and then we’ll be running it or putting it into the molds.”

The cheese is aged in rooms that would surely be on any rodent’s bucket list. With 20 varieties on hand, you’ll find all kinds of queso.

“We make sheep Gouda and then we thought well, let’s marry the two and so now we have a blend, which is gorgeous,” Stuart said. “Now you’re just making everything Gouda. “Yeah. That’s a cheese joke, everything Gouda.”

Connie gave us a crash course on this culinary delight.

“We’re gonna go over here next to our sheep cheese, this is called Wooly Texas,” Connie said. “This is all sheep. We have a couple of all sheep cheeses, and a couple that are cow and sheep blend. So it’s gonna have a little bit different flavor to it, ’cause it’s a different type of milk. It’s really not saltier, it’s just how it hits your pallet. What happens is that cheese ages, they’re all aged at different amounts of time, flavors will concentrate, so you’ll taste them more but actually, so it doesn’t actually have more salt.”

It’s all comes down to happy cows and sheep making the most of their milk. With cheese this good, the Veldhuizen farm in Dublin is a can’t miss stop on the Texas Bucket List.

“I really feel that I’m really living more than the American Dream, because I get to have all these people at home at a place where we work and live life, it’s beautiful,” Stuart said.

The Texas Bucket List – National Videogame Museum in Frisco

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Frisco – If the theme song to the old Nintendo game Super Mario Brothers still strikes a cord when it comes to your childhood, and a chance to play the game itself floods you heart full of memories. Now, you can Super Mario until the sun sets at a stupendously sized museum in Frisco known as the National Videogame Museum.

“I feel like I’m 14 again,” Michelle Ybarra said.

John Hardie heads the charge when it comes to these plug and play pieces of equipment that have stood the test of time for the most part.

“Everyday, I turn them on, and it’s like, ‘What’s not gonna come up today?,’” John said. “They’re that finicky, you know?”

Originally from New York,  John moved down to Texas when his museum become a reality in 2017.

“…My wife’s from Texas,” John said.” I lived in San Antonio for five years in the 80’s, so that made me an honorary Texan. They allowed me to move back.”

John and a couple of buddies had a big collection of back in the day technology. What used to be a traveling display of yesteryear’s hottest Christmas toys has turned into a full time interactive collection at the museum where having fun is not frowned upon.

“Traditionally, you hit a button and maybe something lights up,” John said. “There’s not much interactivity in a museum, and we felt that we had to turn that model on its head and do something complete out of the … everything had to be interactive. Kids today, they’re adaptable. They’ll play anything, right? They like the new stuff, of course, but they’ll play the old stuff, even though the graphics aren’t as pretty or whatever. Dads like us, you know, you and me … we grew up with this stuff. So it was second nature to easily … to bring those people in.”

While showing up your kids at your kind of games in popular around here, it’s also about showing the younger generation what life was like back in the 80’s.

“So this is two of my favorite exhibits,” John said.  “We have recreations of an 80’s living room and an 80’s bedroom. The 80’s living room is something we’ve been doing since we started doing shows. We always had just a couch and a TV and period/era type stuff, and people always identified with it. The wood paneling, the fake plant. Right? Your afghan on the back of the couch. This was your mom’s or your grandma’s living room, you know?”

One of the most popular spots in the whole complex is a recreation of an 80’s video arcade.

“It’s called ‘Pixel Dreams’, and 42 arcade machines from the era,” John said. “Neon, blacklight. The 80’s music. We have a high score board. You get your name up there if you beat the house champion. And you can see all pretty much every classic that people really will remember or identify with.”

The amount of games, gadgets and interactive displays seems as long as the list of game titles the ol’ Blockbusters used to have.  From virtual reality, one of kind games, to prototypes of popular gaming accessories like the original power glove this museum has it all.

“I think there’s still a stigma today,” John said. “You talk to somebody, ‘What do you do?’ ‘I run a museum.’ And I shouldn’t feel this way, because I know what it is, but they’re like, ‘Oh, what kind of museum?’ I’m like, ‘Video games,’ you know? And it’s just the way I was raised, because even growing up, there came a point where you were supposed to stop playing video games.”

We’re all still kids at heart, and the National Videogame Museum doesn’t just bring us back. It lets us show our kids just how totally radical life was all those years ago making it a fun filled stop on the Texas Bucket List.

I like how there’s the games when my father was a kid here, and I never knew it’d come this far in these years all the way from the 1900’s to the 2000’s,” Andy Castillo said. “It’s a long time.”

 

The Texas Bucket List – J. Lorraine Ghost Town in Manor

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Manor – Texas ghost towns have a lore of their own.  Stories of the Old West and a connection to the past makes these sorts of places the perfect stop to ponder what life was like in the good ole days. In the ghost town of J. Lorraine, just off of 290 in Manor, you won’t find hardcore history because this place is here just for fun.

“Before I retired, I started the ghost town,” George T. Richards said.

George is about as much a cowboy as his town deserves a historical marker.

“I wear a cowboy hat, but I’m afraid of horses,” George said. “ They could step on you.”

For some reason, he really likes old western towns. George’s family moved to San Antonio when he was a young boy, and after getting his degree at Texas State University, he went on to serve in Navy.  

“At one point I was on the flight deck of the USS Independence, we were off the coast of Florida, and we watched one of the Apollo rockets,” George said. “I felt like singing The Star Spangled Banner, or something. So here I’m on an aircraft carrier watching a moon rocket go up.”

Eventually he went on to work for the Texas Attorney General’s office as a system analyst, but before he retired, he took to the town, his own town.  He began building everything on this 15-acre estate.

“My mantra was, at least one more board a day,” George said.  “Every day I would come out, on the weekends. I would come out and just keep adding to it.”

Since he was not a craftsman by trade, there were a few learning curves.

“I will say I wasn’t a carpenter, and whatever I’m doing wrong, I’m really good at it now, ’cause I keep doing it the same way,” George said.

He kept on hammering and gave his retro retirement community a name that was close to his heart.

“I named it after my daughter, Jennifer Lorraine,” George said. “It’s J. Lorraine, Texas.”

20 buildings make up the majority of J. Lorraine, and each little corner has its own unique characteristic about it.  It’s as if each little part of the place could tell a story of its own.

“I thought I was gonna make a big western perimeter, and in the middle would be the bar and the dance hall area,” George said. “Then I started that front façade and I realized that I didn’t know what I was doing.”

All kidding aside, the most common theme you’ll find in these parts is a place to pop a top.

“That just happens to be,” George said. “This is a bar town, I guess. Every other building’s a bar I guess.”

What exactly would convince a man to build his own world, his own reality?  Well, he just wanted his own magical place.

“I remember as a kid, I was watching TV and this guy would come on T.V., and he had built a place that had Adventureland, Tomorrowland, Frontierland … It was Walt Disney,” George said. “And it stunned me as a kid that grownups would build something that was just for fun. I thought, ‘Wow, that’s pretty neat. When I grow up, I’m gonna build something just for fun.’ So this is my little tiny Disney World.”

J. Lorraine is open to the public and has a maze, a theater, and all sorts of places to explore.  What you won’t find here are ticket booths. This small world comes with a small price: Free.

“I always say we’re kind of desolate out here, and we have been,” George said. “It’s hard enough to get people to come out anyhow, so if I charge them to come in, I don’t know if I’d have many people anyhow.”

Walt Disney once said that the real trouble with the world is that too many people grow up.  For a guy like George, well if the boot fits. Exploring J. Lorraine is well worth a stop on the Texas Bucket List.

“Well, I’m glad y’all stopped by, and get anybody else who wants to stop by to an old western town, we’d be glad to have them,” George said.

The Texas Bucket List – Mrs. Lee’s Daffodil Garden in Gladewater

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Gladewater – Over in Northeast Texas, between Tyler and Gladewater, you’ll find a few back roads that beckon to be explored.  During the month of February, the trees are still waking from their winter slumber. If you follow the long twisty turns through the thicket, you’ll come across a garden that springs into action earlier than others,  Mrs. Lee’s Daffodil Garden.

“This is Mrs. Lee’s garden,” Dennis Phelps said. “It’s the world’s best kept secret in East Texas.”

Dennis  is a former petroleum engineer who moved to East Texas from Midland to take on the perfect retirement gig.

“If I could pick my dream one then I’d pick this one,” Dennis said.

Maintaining millions of perennials in this lush 28-acre garden is a far cry from Dennis’s days in West Texas, and that’s a good thing.

“It’s just real peaceful,” Dennis said. “You can do a lot of deep thinking. There’s nobody out here but me, for the most part. “

During the majority of the year, usually 11 months or so, the garden looks like your typical East Texas terrain. Around the middle of February, and only for a few short weeks, something magical happens.  Daffodils direct from Holland put on a dynamic display. This was all started in the 1950’s by a woman named Helen Lee.

“It’s spelled Helen, and that’s the way people are going to pronounce it, but she pronounced it ‘Heelen,’” Dennis said.

Helen’s husband left her this piece of property after he passed away, and she turned it into a paradise. She converted gravel pits into lakes stocked with fish and bought a literal boxcar of daffodil bulbs from Holland.  Mrs. Lee enjoyed her gardens until she passed away in 1984, and it was her request that the gardens be maintained and open to the public during the bloom.

“That’s what she wanted,” Dennis said. “That’s the reason the land was kept together and I’m sure she’s up in heaven saying, ‘Good job.’”

Now, the only issue when it comes to viewing these delicate daffodils occurs if it drizzles.  

“We’ve seen a lot of storm damage here in the last couple of years,” Dennis said. “We’ve had years when we’ve been open one day. We’ve had years when we haven’t opened at all. And then, normally we’ll get a couple of weeks out of it.”

The serene setting of the gardens provides a great stop on The Texas Bucket List to enjoy the beauty of our great state, even if it’s transplanted from another part of the world.  In Texas, everything thrives once it finds its footing.

“Yeah, I think God’s doing good enough by Himself,” Dennis said “All I’m supposed to do is mow and keep the grass cut so when they come up they’ll bloom again. And that’s pretty easy.”

The Texas Bucket List – Washington’s Birthday Celebration in Laredo

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Laredo – Festive, fun, and full of life.  Celebrating is easy to come by in Laredo, Texas. From January to February, Laredo throws a bash fit for a king, though fortunately he rejected the offer. George Washington was the first President of the United States and down in the border town the George Washington Birthday Celebration is a fitting party for a politician that never affiliated with one.

“We know how to have a really good time,” Veronica Castillon, Lifetime Director of Washington’s Birthday Celebration, said. “We have a great time, but tomorrow morning we gotta get up and do it again, so space yourself, space some energy.”

Veronica plays a huge role in this presidential party that’s been a part of Laredo since 1898.  

“Here in Laredo we’re very good about celebrating El Cinco de Mayo and Diez y Seis de Septiembre,” Veronica said. “We do that very well, so now let’s do something that’s American. Why not George Washington’s birthday?”

The celebration started back in February of 1898 when a fraternal organization called the Improved Order of the Red Men captured city hall in a mock battle. The key to the city was presented to the chief of the tribe, who handed it to Princess Pocahontas.  It’s been said that the Sons of Liberty of the American Revolution held the same sort of ritual, and George Washington posed as the Chief. For some reason, this really resonated with Laredo in the 1800’s, and over 100 years later the party has grown.

“We have the nation’s largest and longest celebration of George Washington,” Veronica said. “Freedom and democracy. We celebrate everything he stood for.”

The majority of the celebration takes place in February.  Parties, parades, pageants and plenty of particulars go into this massive celebration put on by the Washington’s Birthday Celebration Association, which offices out of a building built to look like Mount Vernon.

“We’ve got to celebrate something in Laredo that’s truly American,” Veronica said. “If you look inside my closet right now, it looks like Uncle Sam threw up. Everything is red, white, and blue.”

The Martha Washington Pageant is a popular part of celebration as young girls from all over the state showcase fashion that is no longer in style but still incredible to see.

“The dresses, those are works of art,” Veronica said. “You know, if it’s velvet and it’s beaded, if those dresses, and the petticoat. Those things weigh anywhere from 50 to 65 pounds. So you have to learn how to walk and move in it. The first time I put my dress on I go, oh how pretty. And then I tried to move forward, and I couldn’t.”

On the final Saturday of the month, hundreds gather on the square in Laredo and march towards Mexico because a celebration of this size just isn’t the same unless you invite your neighbors. The international bridge is closed off to traffic and grandiose displays of patriotism from both sides of the border can be seen. Slowly, delegations from Laredo, Texas and Nuevo Laredo in Mexico make their way to the middle of the bridge. After all the spectacles have subsided, four children emerge.  A boy and girl from Mexico and another pair from the U.S.A. meet in the middle. The future of the two countries aren’t here to debate or to get a look at what life is like on the other side of the border, they’re here to hug.

“To me the bridge ceremony is the heart of our celebration,” Veronica said. “It’s just the way of us every year, announcing to the world, or demonstrating to the world, our friendship. The river that runs through here, it’s not a divider, it’s actually a connector. We drink the same water, we ride the same bridges on a daily basis.”

The children make way for adults, city, state, and even national leaders to exchange flags and do something this world so desperately needs: Take a moment to show a little love for one another.

“We have so much in common with our friends and families in Nuevo Laredo,” Veronica said. “We’re human, we all bleed the same, I like to say. We like to party together. And we like to build relationships. We like to build strong, safe communities for our children and grandchildren.”

The George Washington Birthday Celebration in Laredo is one of kind. It’s a border town with a big place in its’ heart for a man who never even knew what the state of Texas would become.  Somehow, he still brings people together, and being a part of this month long celebration truly is well worth a stop on The Texas Bucket List.

“I really don’t believe that we’re the only community that has a sister city that maintains a long lasting ties that go back hundreds of years,” Veronica said. “But, we’re probably the only one that demonstrates it so festively as we do here in Laredo during Washington’s birthday.”

The Texas Bucket List – Traintopia in Frisco

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Frisco – In a big building dedicated to discovery in Frisco, you’ll find a smorgasbord of things to do.  If you stay on track, all the way to the back of the building you’ll find a mighty display on a miniature level.

It’s called Traintopia and it’s part of the Museum of American Railroad in Frisco.

“You’ll see trains moving about while you actually walk around the entire layout,” Bob LaPrelle said. “You’re going to see seven different operating lines.”

Bob is the President and CEO of the Museum of the American Railroad. The museum is home to all sorts of big trains, and they are all historically significant.

“It’s an amazing creation,” Bob said.

Bob was all aboard when the museum was approached about receiving the train set as a donation from Jane Sanders.  She had inherited the collection from her husband Steve. Steve was a former oilman and precious metals collector who owned a hobby shop and had a lot of love for little locomotives.

“She was in a real dilemma about what to do with this $1 million train layout that Stephen had built and it’s a win-win situation, because she was able to get it out of her home, sell her house, and we were able to add a fantastic exhibit to the museum,” Bob said.

Piece by piece, the train set was moved to Frisco and painstakingly reassembled.

“It really appeals to people of all ages,” Bob said. “I mean adults love it. The thing to notice on this layout is also the mural, the backdrop, which was actually hand-painted in the Sanders’ home and then we photographed it and reproduced it on the wall here in Frisco.”

Depicting the American Southwest from Dallas to Colorado, the massive 2500 square foot set with a quarter mile worth of track is stacked with scenarios.

“You’ve got the curio shops and the little tourist courts up here in New Mexico, very similar to what you would have seen in Cimarron Canyon,” Bob said. “New Mexico kind of transitions into Arizona. You start getting some beautiful colors and hues. Then it transitions into West Texas, so you got the oil refineries and you got the tank cars at the refinery loading up crude oil, going out by rail obviously, and then a small West Texas town. Downtown Dallas is really where it all culminates, and you have a very active Main Street from about 1965 showing all the theater marquees, all the tall buildings, the Magnolia building, the Adolphus Hotel, and even Durand Chevrolet. Then finally you end up at Dallas Union Terminal, where all the passenger trains arrived and departed from Dallas. Every time I look at this layout I see something new. There’s just so much finite detail, you know, that they brought into this layout, and they all tell a story of Steve Sanders. That’s what’s amazing. “

The town transitions between day and night.  Blinking lights, signs, and the Palo Duro drive in take on an all new life in the darkness. It has been said the Devil is in the details, but here that means so much more.   It’s the particulars in the people, and the curious conversations they all seem to be having with minute meanings in everything.

“One of the things that we’ve really tried to do with this layout beyond entertainment is to inspire a new generation, introduce them to the world of railroads and the world of trains,” Bob said. “There are still careers out there that people can pursue in the railroad industry and there’s a lot to learn from this layout. “

Be it day or night, you can stop by Traintopia and get a first class ticket to a world frozen in time on the tracks that now a treasure Texans can hop on board with. Traintopia certainly makes for a unique stop on The Texas Bucket List.

“This was only available to a small number of people that Steve knew and now everybody can enjoy it, so it’s a must see,” Bob said.

The Texas Bucket List – Fort Chadbourne in Coke County

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Coke County-This week, we take you to a fort in Coke County, Texas that is filled to the brim with artifacts from another time.  It’s the grounds of this old fort and a man’s passion for telling this story that makes Fort Chadbourne well worth a stop on The Texas Bucket List.

We’re in Coke County at Fort Chadbourne.

“If you’re transferred to Fort Chadbourne in 1852 as a soldier, you’re sitting in the middle of Comanche territory,” Garland Richards said.

Garland knows this old post inside and out because he’s been exploring it since he was boy.

“I assumed that everyone had a fort in their backyard,” Garland said. “Seriously, I did not know any different.No one has enjoyed Fort Chadbourne more than me.”

Garland’s great-great-great grandfather Thomas Odem established a 150,000-acre ranch here in 1876.

“It stretched from Fort Chadbourne almost to San Angelo, encompassed a portion of Ballinger,”  Garland Richards said. “Got to realize that in 1876, there were no fences and it was all open range and this is where he chose to bring his family and raise 13 kids and utilize as the ranching headquarters for his cattle operation.”

Passed down through eight generations, Garland is now the caretaker of his own parcel that happens to feature this old fortification. A few years ago, he couldn’t bare to watch it continue to fade from memory.  He decided to rebuild and reinforce Fort Chadbourne.

“This is not the brightest thing that I’ve ever done financially,” Garland said.

In 1999, he founded the Fort Chadbourne foundation and funded this entire project privately.

“They told us that you can’t raise the funds needed to complete this project without governmental funding and we did it,” Garland said.

Each building on the property was painstakingly brought back to life.

“This is the ranch headquarters building,” Garland said. “This was a double officer’s quarters. This is where my great-great-great-grandfather comes in and he chooses these two structures that are joined together and he raises 13 kids. The archaeological excavation of this building told us how it was actually constructed. That’s the way we did it. Tried to keep everything as authentic as we could keep it. I’ve been working on this for about 20 years.”

During the renovations, artifacts were constantly being found. Even today, you can find things laying around all over the fort among the red velvet mites.

Now, we’re in the Butterfield Stage Stop,” Garland said. “You’ve got pieces of hinges, you’ve got the … this is a green beer bottle. You’ve got square nails. You are literally picking up artifacts off the ground. You’ve got a piece of glass, there’s the maker. You could actually find the … There’s a BDK on the bottom of it, you could actually find who made that bottle and when. That’s all you need is three letters to figure out that all that history.”

All the military and personal items Garland and his team have found can be see just a few feet from where they originated in the Fort Chadbourne visitors center.  

“There are about a million artifacts that have come from Fort Chadbourne,” Garland said. “This is one of the most historically significant, pristine, unmolested sites of any of the frontier forts in the United States.“

Since the fort has been privately owned all these years, Garland has been able to painstakingly catalog and display everything they’ve come across. I do mean everything.

“ A lot of the artifacts from Fort Chadbourne are located in some of the drawers,” Garland said. “All of these drawers are filled with artifacts. Anything from cannonballs to musket balls to surgical instruments. These came out of the cannonball shrapnel field. This is where they actually blew up. Anything from shotgun shells, to gun parts, to coffee grinders.”

Perusing the preposterous amount of pieces that were actually found on the property is impressive.

“Anything that was dropped from 1852 to 1876 there’s one of in here,” Garland said.

Coins, wedding rings, glasses and all sorts of military memorabilia have been found here.

“The buttons that you see in this case, you’ve got artillery, you’ve got the dragoons, you’ve got the cavalry, you’ve got mounted riflemen, infantry,” Garland said. “There’s Texas Military buttons. All found here. It’s part of the history of Fort Chadbourne.”

Every little thing here helps tell the story of Fort Chadbourne. With the abundance of artifacts, it’s a Texas-sized story.

“You’ll go out there and you’ll find other little pieces to the puzzle and when you put enough pieces to the puzzle back together, all of a sudden you can see the whole picture,” Garland said.

During it’s time as a fort, 27 soldiers lost their lives here. Six of them were awarded the Medal of Honor.  As a tribute, you’ll find all 3,500 recipients of that honor listed among a collection of actual Medals of Honor.

“These are the current Medals of Honor,” Garland said. “This is one of the early Civil War Medals of Honor. The rarest one in here is the Tiffany Cross. To be able to walk in and see all of these all in one place is pretty incredible.”

Seeing this incredible collection, hearing the stories, and exploring the fort is truly a treat for any Texan. As an added bonus, Garland brought out the big guns: A replica mountain howitzer cannon.

If you’re looking to dive deep into some valuable Texas History, Fort Chadbourne is well worth a stop on The Texas Bucket List.

“We’ve still got a lot of work to do at Fort Chadbourne,” Garland said. “I’ll die long before I ever get my job done. Somebody else will come in and take it over.”  

The Texas Bucket List- Copper Breaks State Park in Quanah

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Quanah – When traveling west in the Lone Star State, it doesn’t take long for the terrain to start taking on a whole other look.  About an hour outside of Wichita Falls, you’ll the route to an incredible state park, just south of Quanah. Sitting on 1900 acres on the banks of the Pease River, this picturesque Permian part of Texas gives you the feeling that this is where the west begins.

We’re at Copper Breaks State Park.

“The nice solitude, open space is very serene,” Edwin Quintero said. “If you’re looking to get away from the city and really enjoy nature this is it.”

Edwin is the Park superintendent, and he’s originally from the Valley.

“My background is in Biology,” Edwin said. “As you can see this is perfect terrain for snakes. “

Head up or tails up, we don’t want to come across any copperheads at Copper Breaks.

“I knew I was gonna travel around the state and that’s why I like you know working for Texas Parks and Wildlife,” Edwin said. “You get to see some beautiful parts of the state.”

Edwin took us on a tour of the park that used to be the homestead of Comanche and Kiowa tribes.

“During the winter this is where you would see all their settlements,” Edwin said.

The rigids and peaks of Copper Breaks provided protection from the elements but also sparked interest from mining companies after the Civil War.

“All that greenish streaks on horizontal lines on the breaks that is the mineral form of copper,” Edwin said.  “It wasn’t profitable, I mean there was copper it was actually taking more money to mine for it than to actually see any of the profits from the copper. “

What the park does see is a massive amount of biodiversity.  With 80 species of reptiles and amphibians as well as being a central flyway for migratory animals, there are all sorts of passersby. However, there are a few permanent residents that roam the prairie.

“This is why Copper Breaks is very unique. We have 5 of the official longhorn heard and these guys are pretty awesome actually,” Edwin said. “You get to go to other parks where they have longhorns but I’ll tell you what you don’t get to get up close and personal with these guys. They’re very majestic, very rustic and this is what Texas is all about. It’s an iconic symbol of Texas.”

Feeding the large longhorns is something you can check off your bucket list.

“They love these cattle cubes they are basically like you know like m&m’s to them, very sweet,” Edwin said.

If you’re feeling like you need some longhorn love, just pucker up.

“ When you have handsome young fellows like me here all you have to is you have to go over and tell it ‘Hey Raider give me a kiss’”, Edwin said. “Nowhere else in Texas do you get to see kissing longhorns out here, but you don’t have to bribe them with some cattle feed or anything like that.”

 

If you’re looking for a serene state park with stunning surroundings and some slobbery steers, Copper Breaks State Park in Quanah is quite the stop on The Texas Bucket List.

“If you wanna come in and really experience solitude and the dark skies definitely come out to Copper Breaks,” Edwin said.

The Texas Bucket List – The Priest with Pups in Mission

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Mission – This week we’re counting our blessings at a church down by the border.  We’re at a place that is is your typical Catholic parish, but a priest with a special connection to man’s best friend makes going to mass on Sunday a marvelous stop on The Texas Bucket List.

We’re at Our Lady of Guadalupe Catholic Church in Mission

“It’s a little unorthodox. But as you can see, people love it,” Artie Solis said.

Since 1968, Father Roy has called the Valley home.  After graduating from Texas A&M, he became a priest and in ‘74 joined the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate, a group of priests known as the Cavalry of Christ that originated in France and has been in this part of Texas since 1849.  Fittingly, Father Roy is known as the Cowboy Priest.

“This church is everything to this community, especially Father Roy,” Mary Allen Tabor said. “He brings in the people.”

Now, it’s not every Catholic church service you hear country songs during mass, but you do here. Throw in the dogs that attend the service as well, and you’ve got quite the combination.

“They just know how to sit and be good,” Father Roy said. “They love me and I love them.”

It didn’t take long for stray cat to strain that relationship.

“Hey, there they go,” Father Roy said. “That’s the cat! I told you, that darn cat had to mess everything up.”

It took a while to get the trinity of tail wagging show stealers back on track.

“They don’t stay gone long,” Father Roy said. “Get over here! They’ll quit running around. Terrible dog. Come here.  Now sit. Why do you have to act like an animal? Oh that’s right, you are an animal.”

Fortunately, during services at our Lady of Guadalupe, the pups are much more behaved.

“It’s good for your soul,” Father Roy said. “Good for your heart. And it’s good for the hearts of the people. You know when you look at those puppies and your heart kind of gets lifted up? That’s the work of the spirit. That’s the spirit right there. The spirit of life. That created spirit of God. The spirit of love.”

As the service get started, it seems like most masses you might find. That is until you take a second to get sneak peak at the priest and his pooches.  Once the opening hymn is over and the readings commence, Father Roy and his friends fill their purpose of passing along the word of God’s while truly making the church feel like home.

“If you’ve ever loved a dog, or been loved by a dog, you know that has to do something with the spirit of God,” Father Roy said. “That’s for sure. It ennobles your heart, and it gladdens His heart a little bit, too. It does.”  

Despite the occasional drink out of the baptismal font,  the fond chasers of felines don’t really disturb the formality of the mass.  They’re used to being a part of it and playing a role in more ways than most realize.  It seems this experience gives something different to each parishioner.

“It’s the unconditional love,” Maria Quellar said. “When you have a pet and they just … They’re happy to see you when you get home. They’re sad to see you leave. And I just think that the church is the same. It’s just about love. It’s unconditional love.”

For Father Roy, it’s all about making the church a comfortable place for all to come.

“It helps the kids at church,” Father Roy said. “The church … God bless us, especially the Catholic church can be awful rigid, frigid, and formal. We’re kind of infamous for that. So a kid who can hardly stand to sit through all that rigmarole for an hour, walks in there and sees this old dog, and he says, ‘Well, shoot if that dog can put up with it for an hour maybe I can, too.’”

“There’s nothing more beautiful than when a child opens their heart and welcomes Christ,” Maria said. “And I think that that’s because of Father Roy.”

Father Roy will always fight for all his friends because at Our Lady of Guadalupe, it truly is about and I do mean all of God’s creatures.

“Now we’ve got 12 dogs and two donkeys, two llamas, two peacocks,” Artie said.

Fortunately, it’s only the pups that are allowed in on weekly basis.

“I just think that it is a complete representation and the extension of the love that he has, that he’s able to give that love,” Maria said. “He gives us that same love. And you feel it when you’re here.”

Father Roy definitely provides a unique and incredible stop on The Texas Bucket List.

“We hope we’ll lift up your heart with the spirit of the one who was born in the stable,” Father Roy said. “And who formed a team of old fishermen to celebrate the mystery and communicate the message of His love. We think we can do that. We hope we can. We pray that we can.”

The Texas Bucket List – P-6 Farms in Montgomery

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Montgomery – Fall is always a fun time in Texas. As the temperature around Texas starts to dial back a bit, you’ll also find a few cornfields built for brave souls who don’t mind getting lost for a little while.

We decided to test our sense of direction down in Montgomery at P-6 Farms.

“It’s so cool, isn’t it?” Carey Poole said.

Carey Poole is the leading lady at P-6 Farms which is a far cry from her uprising in an urban setting.

“I’m a city girl,” Carey said. “I’m from Austin. Never in a million years would I have thought this was my job.”

She started this harvest festival with her husband Bo after he had one heck of an idea.  

“My husband is an old soul at heart,” Carey said. “Anything that brings back the past, that’s what he loves to do.”

Tired of tirelessly working on the road with construction and storm cleanup, Bo wanted to make the family farm a tourist attraction tied to agriculture.  So, in 2011 P-6 Farms formally let people flood their fields.

“It just seemed like it was the right thing for our family to do, bring him home and be all together as a network,” Carey said. “His mom works out in the grill. My mom works in the pumpkin patch. My dad works at the front gate. If it weren’t for our kids and our family, we wouldn’t be where we are.”

Over the course of eight weekends in the fall, thousands make their way to Montgomery to pick the perfect pumpkin, cozy up to cotton and let the kids blow off some steam.

“I love it,” Carey said.  “There’s nothing better than the giggles of kids. They come in clean as a whistle, smiling, happy, ready to have a grand time. They leave filthy dirty, crying because they don’t wanna leave. So, I know I’m doing my job.”

The biggest attraction at P-6 is an eight acre corn field that happens to be one big maze.

“Is it not crazy?” Carey said.

This laid out labyrinth isn’t just random rows and routes. There’s a method to the maze madness.  To get a good idea about what you’re dealing with, it’s better to have a sky-high view. It takes about a year to plan out what particular pattern the corn maze will have.  With a World Championship still fresh on the minds of fans, a huge field dedicated to the Houston Astros has been a home-run, except for the folks who can’t find their way out.

“All the time they get lost,” Carey said. “But, that’s why we have a 30-foot tower. So they can look up, signal how do I get out. They tell them right, left, straight, go this way, go that way, and it’s all in good fun.”

Getting caught up in this corn maze is only a small part of what Carey hopes families carry out of this experience.  

“They need to spend quality time outdoors,” Carey said. “They need to de-escalate and enjoy themselves.”

It’s also a learning experience for kids who might not get a chance to go to the farm frequently.

“It’s nice for the kids to know where the food comes from,” Carey said. “Majority of them have no idea where their food comes from. It comes from the grocery store. So, it’s nice to educate them about the importance of farmers.”

Eventually the field will be plowed, and the corn turned into feed, but for a few weeks in the fall you can get lost on a little piece of property known as P-6 Farms. Make sure to check out this fleeting fall experience that is well worth a stop on The Texas Bucket List.

“We’re already planning for next year,” Carey said. “You plan before your current season is up.”