Tuesday in paradise!

Welcome from heaven on earth!

Today, we took a drive from here to the Natural Bridge Caverns; the largest and most ornate limestone cavern in all of Texas and the wildlife ranch that runs adjacent.

It was pretty incredible!

I'd been through the caverns before around twenty years ago, but I didn't get to see a lot on that trip; I was pushing a twin stroller around when I could, carrying it when I could not! Anyway, I got to see everything this time around and we took our time and took pictures everywhere! When we got done, we went through the wildlife ranch next door. We saw all of the African animals and a few that are rare but NOT African. They have emus and ostriches; they have caribou, antelope, gnus, impala, wildebeast, cape buffalo, American Bison, longhorn cattle, pronghorn, zebras, giraffes, white rhinocerous, all sorts of goats and deer, and a lot of other stuff I can't even remember. MDB wanted to take pictures of them all, but she used up her battery in the cavern....

It was a lot of fun anyway! There's a place where the "road" on the "safari" goes either right or left. The first time through we went right and didn't see a whole lot other than goats. We decided we'd go through again once we finished the first run through, this time going left. We saw ALL KINDS of stuff we missed the first time! That when we saw the American Bison (we'd have missed it if we hadn't gone back!!!) and the longhorns! All of the Cape Buffalo we on the left, and the only widebeast we saw were on that trail, also. We also saw axis deer, red stag, and more of the goats we'd seen earlier! It was really well-worth the return trip, that's for sure!

When we finished, we decided we'd take a drive up to Wimberley and do the glass factory and the little shops there in town. The glass blower was off, but they had some really nice stuff to see. Wimberley was pretty much what you'd expect; a lot of overpriced "tourist" stuff, but the people were nice and the drive in was AWESOME!!!

Even more awesome was the drive OUT! We took RM 12 (most of the rural roads in Texas are "FM" designated; that's "Farm to Market," but route 12 is a "Ranch to Market" road) back to TX 32 and that back to Canyon Lake. The drive was perhaps the most breathtaking scenery I've ever seen, both on the road from Wimberley to Canyon Lake and then the drive around Canyon Lake itself. The whole area is just beautiful; a big part of why we love it so much!