Frontier Texas!

While staying in Abilene, Texas we visited their Frontier Texas! museum, focused on the old west, especially around buffalo hunting.

Outside

Buffalo

Sign

The experience starts with an intro video, narrated by Buck Taylor of the Gunsmoke TV show and western movies; we had the theater and exhibits to ourselves:

Intro video

Exhibits:

Start of exhibits

Exhibits

Each section has a “hologram” guide that can narrate stories:

Hologram guide

Exhibits

The last area is the Frontier Experience Theater, with swivelable stools and screens all around, where they tell more about the times:

Frontier Experience Theater

Gift shop:

Gift shop

Exit

Abilene KOA Journey

We stayed at Abilene KOA Journey in Abilene, Texas. (Campground Reviews listing.)

A very basic KOA, with loud freeway traffic.

Dates:

Check in: 2023-02-23
Check out: 2023-02-25
2 nights

Weather:

Cloudy
High temps ranging between 48-57°F, lows around 35-41°F
Negligible wind

Noise:

Loud road noise from the freeway; distant train noise
No neighbor noise

Site:

#58, pull-through, gravel
All the pull-throughs are buddy sites, except this one and the one next to it, where they converted the next-door site to a patio
Didn’t need to disconnect toad; parked behind coach
Level site
Medium site: about 60 feet long by about 30 feet wide
Concrete patio
Patio table & chairs
Fire pit
Propane & charcoal grills
A few trees

Utilities:

50 amp power, fairly conveniently located
60 PSI water, conveniently located
Good sewer connection, somewhat conveniently located (2 10-foot pipes needed)

Internet (in usage priority order):

T-Mobile: 46-62 Mbps down, 8 Mbps up, 50 ms ping
AT&T: 5 Mbps down, 9 Mbps up, 78 ms ping
Verizon: 1 Mbps down, 0.5 Mbps up, 200 ms ping
Starlink: not used
Campground Wi-Fi: not used

Amenities:

Garbage pickup from site

Our review on Campground Reviews:

Buddy sites and road noise

We stayed here for two nights which was about one night more than necessary. The pull-throughs were pretty much all buddy sites (which I hate), but we splurged on the patio site which meant that we had a little buffer between us and our neighbor on the living side (nevermind that our neighbor the first night seemed to think it was a communal area, but I digress). The real downside of this park is the constant noise from I-20 with trucks using their jake brakes at all hours. We camped at Abilene KOA Journey in a Motorhome.

Tip for Other Campers: Frontier Texas! (the exclamation point is part of the name) was pretty cool and worth a stop.

An interactive map of the park:

The map:

Map

Our site:

Our site

A nice patio, that we didn’t use, since the weather wasn’t great; but still worth it to avoid being in a buddy site:

Patio

A nice fire pit area on the patio:

Fire pit

A GIF of the freeway from our site, showing how close it was:

Freeway

Our site

Bathrooms:

Bathrooms

Cabins:

Cabins

Other sites:

Other sites

This RV park was a convenient stop for a couple of nights, but we wouldn’t choose to stay here other than for that purpose, what with the loud freeway noise and buddy sites.

Video

Video: Gordonville, Texas to Abilene, Texas motorhome travel timelapse

A timelapse of driving our RV, a Tiffin Allegro Bus motorhome, 244 miles from Gordonville, Texas to Abilene, Texas.

Travel from Gordonville to Abilene, Texas

We drove our coach 244 miles, about four hours of driving, from Gordonville, Texas to Abilene, Texas.

Here’s the map route, heading south then west:

Map route

Leaving the Thousand Trails campground:

Leaving campground

A rather rough road:

Rough road

Onramp to I-35, and interesting clouds:

Onramp and interesting clouds

Denton, Texas, “the home of happiness“:

Denton, the home of happiness

Exit to I-35W:

Exit to I-35W

Sleepy Paladin:

Sleepy Paladin

We never did visit a Buc-ees:

Buc-ees

A big cloud by the side of the road; we thought it was a fire at first, but it appeared to be some roadworks thing:

Roadside cloud

There were a lot of roadworks; we don’t enjoy having a barrier so close to the edge of the lane, since our coach takes pretty much the whole lane:

Roadworks

Exit to I-820, marking the start of our westward migration:

Exit to I-820

Exit to I-30:

Exit to I-30

Exit 420; we didn’t take that exit, I just thought it was “nice” (unsurprisingly, the only sign was above the road):

Exit 420

We stopped for lunch at a truck stop:

At a truck stop

Lunch at the Iron Skillet Restaurant:

Iron Skillet Restaurant

We do enjoy breakfast for lunch:

Breakfast for lunch

Back to our coach:

Back to our coach

Truck foursome:

Trucks towing trucks

A very empty rest stop:

Rest stop

Wide loads:

Wide loads

Wide load

A rolling work convoy:

Work convoy

Another wide load:

Wide load

Our destination:

Our destination

Dryer magnets

The door on the dryer in our coach (yes, we have a washer and dryer) tends to swing closed when open. So I attached a couple of strong magnets to the cupboard and dryer doors to keep it open.

Here are the magnets I used:

Magnets

I attached them to the doors with Glue Dots:

Glue Dots

I do have magnets with self-adhesive backs, but they aren’t as powerful, and I need opposite polarities for each magnet so they stick together, so using the glue dots on the magnets works better:

Glue dot on magnet

A magnet on the dryer door:

Magnet on dryer

And a magnet on the enclosing cupboard door:

Magnet on door

They meet and hold the door open:

Door and dryer

Thousand Trails Lake Texoma RV Campground

We stayed at Thousand Trails Lake Texoma RV Campground in Gordonville, Texas. (Campground Reviews listing.)

Another Thousand Trails, more of the state park feel.

Dates:

Check in: 2023-02-16
Check out: 2023-02-23
7 nights

Weather:

Some sunny days
High temps ranging between 49-80°F, lows around 28-53°F
Some wind, up to 30 MPH gusts

Noise:

No road noise or train noise
No neighbor noise

Site:

#A43, pull-through, gravel
Buddy site, but on end so nobody facing us (other than the bathroom block)
Didn’t need to disconnect toad; parked in front of coach
Not very level front to back or side to side; used blocks to help front jacks
Medium site: about 80 feet long by about 25 feet wide
Picnic table
Fire pit
Grass & trees

Utilities:

50 amp power, fairly conveniently located
75 PSI water, conveniently located (disconnected during sub-freezing nights)
Non-threaded sewer connection, very conveniently located (1 10-foot pipe needed)

Internet (in usage priority order):

Starlink: 20-55 Mbps down, 1-6 Mbps up, 30 ms ping
T-Mobile: 13 Mbps down, 2 Mbps up, 28 ms ping
AT&T: 15 Mbps down, 4 Mbps up, 37 ms ping
Verizon: 10 Mbps down, 2 Mbps up, 40 ms ping
Campground Wi-Fi: not used

Amenities:

Garbage dumpster
Closed pools

Our review on Campground Reviews:

Older campground, needs some love

Unusually for a Thousand Trails park, the staff knew what sites were actually available and we were able to select one at check-in. We wanted a 50 amp pull-through but unfortunately, all the 50A pull-throughs are buddy sites. I hate buddy sites. We were lucky enough to get one on the end so our living area wasn’t directly on top of someone else, but it did open up to the bathroom block. Scenic! The site was not at all level front-to-back and we had to maneuver a bit to find the most level location. The roads here are more pothole than road, so maneuvering our coach to avoid the worst of them was interesting. If we’d been planning to stay longer, I would definitely get one of the back-in sites tucked in the trees. We camped at Thousand Trails Lake Texoma in a Motorhome.

An interactive map of the park:

The map:

Map

Our site:

Our site

Rather close to the neighbor:

Our site

Utilities; can’t get any better sewer placement:

Utilities

The view out the buddy-side window wasn’t exciting:

View out window

We used the griddle and ate outside for several meals:

Griddle

Time to add the Virgin Islands National Park sticker to the coach:

Virgin Islands National Park sticker

And Virgin Islands stickers and a pin on the board inside:

Virgin Islands stickers and pin

No, this isn’t another picture of our coach, but a neighboring Tiffin with a very similar paint scheme:

Neighbor RV

This is the 37AP floorplan, a bit smaller than ours:

37AP

On the other side of our site were bathrooms, but separated by some grass, so it wasn’t too bad:

Bathrooms

Other RVs:

Other RVs

More buddy sites:

Buddy sites

A murky but nice pond and island:

Pond

Pond bench

The activity center has a large covered area:

Activity center

Games

Activity pools:

Activity pools

Lodge:

Lodge

Lodge pool:

Lodge pool

Bridge:

Bridge

A corner of Lake Texoma:

Lake

Sunset:

Sunset

Not the fanciest campground, but not too bad. We’d probably opt for a back-in if we stay here again.

Video

Video: Dallas, Texas to Gordonville, Texas motorhome travel timelapse

A timelapse of driving our RV, a Tiffin Allegro Bus motorhome, 76 miles from Dallas, Texas to Gordonville, Texas.

Travel from NIRVC in Dallas to Gordonville, Texas

We drove our coach 76 miles, a bit over an hour of driving, from NIRVC in Dallas, Texas to Gordonville, Texas.

Here’s the map route, heading north:

Map route

We picked up our coach from NIRVC in Dallas, where it had received its annual servicing while we were away:

NIRVC

Paladin sat in the steps for a while:

Paladin

Denton Buc-ees:

Denton Buc-ees

Gainsville:

Gainsville

Our destination, another Thousand Trails:

Thousand Trails

Registration

Starting weekday posts

I’m getting a bit of a backlog of posts, so I’m going to increase the pace to weekdays.

So you can look forward to new Sinclair Trails blog posts Monday through Friday. No posts on weekends.

Paladin on the couch

Travel days from US Virgin Islands

All good things come to an end eventually, and such it was with our USVI vacation.

Driving (on the left, as was the style at the time) our rental car to drop it off:

Driving

A couple of cruise ships:

Cruise ships

The buses on the island are open air things like this colorful example:

Bus

Vodka:

Vodka

Passing by the end of the airport runway:

Airport runway

Rental car return:

Rental car return

The tiny one-terminal airport:

Airport

Some lunch:

Food

“Last sip in the Virgin Islands” on the back of a coffee shop:

Last sip

Our plane arriving:

Our plane

Boarding the plane was a bit of a snafu; they announced general boarding, and everyone rushed forward, but they turned people away for not boarding with their group. Then everyone was lined up outside while the plane was still being cleaned:

Our plane

Boarding:

Our plane

STT to MIA:

STT to MIA

A plane selfie:

Selfie

A view of the cockpit:

Cockpit

Takeoff:

Takeoff

In the air:

In the air

We splurged on business class for this leg. and enjoyed the snacks and beverage:

Snacks and beverage

And dinner:

Dinner

Miami:

In the air

Miami airport:

Plane

Skytrain:

Skytrain

We probably should have taken the skytrain, but weren’t sure where it went; we ended up walking the entire length of this terminal; fortunately we had some time to spare:

Terminal map