Fall Colors and First hike - Cleburne State Park trip

Is it really only four days since 2022 ended? (it was when I started writing this!) It seems like weeks ago.  

And speaking of weeks ago... It is weeks since our RV trip that I want to write about here. It was kind of a big deal since it was our first trip since I injured my foot last July. 

The Sunday after Thanksgiving we drove our motorhome to Cleburne State Park. The Park is about an hour's drive west of us and 12 miles west of the city of Cleburne. 

Our reservations were for a week but we enjoyed it so much that we stayed a few days longer. There is so much I could write about but I'll just hit some of the highlights. 

The Fall colors were stunning and a major highlight. We took lots of photos, as you'll see. 

These next several are from our first short walk together the day after we arrived. It was short in distance anyway... I stopped to take so many pictures that it took a lot longer than we intended. But my foot coped.

It was hard to capture the colors with my regular camera settings so I experimented with the art setting a little. These may seem unbelievable but the colors really were about this bright. The sun shining onto and through the leaves made the colors "pop". 

My patient husband held my hiking poles while I was taking photos.

After our walk I took a rest by the lake while John explored it in a rented canoe. He rented the canoe instead of using our inflatable because he wanted to try out using a small single person canoe. He was thinking of buying one for when he wants to go out by himself because he thought it might be less work and easier to carry than our larger two person inflatable. I think he decided it's not.

John in the rented canoe.
I think the big birds are turkey vultures. They really like those tall trees and I really liked watching them. I won't bore you with all the pictures I took of them.
The lake at the state park is named Cedar Lake. There is another lake in the town of Cleburne that is named Pat Cleburne Lake.

The big high-lite of the trip was several days later when I managed a longer hike. We started out not knowing how far I would be able to go. But I just kept going and made it 2.2 miles. It probably helped that there were lots of pretty things to photograph so we took frequent breaks to take pictures. It was really great to be able to walk so much again. This time to save on weight I only had my cell phone camera. 

The fall colors were still delightful despite the gray sky. 

This picture and the next show part of the flood control channel built by the CCC in the 1930s.

Fungi on a tree trunk.

Other highlights of our trip:

We saw a live theater production of Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol" put on by the Plaza Theatre Company in downtown Cleburne. It was a musical. One of my favorite things about it were the many very old Christmas carols that they wove throughout. 

We also enjoyed a couple of museums: 

The Cleburne Railroad Museum:

It was educational ;-) and also just good fun to watch the model trains and explore the miniature town they built around it. 

There was also a miniature Christmas village set up there just for the season:

We also visited the Chisolm Trail Outdoor Museum which includes the Big Bear Native American Museum--both well worth a visit. The day we were there the cold blustery weather wasn't very conducive to wanting to be outdoors but there were enough things to see inside the buildings so that helped. It was also nice that there were not many other people there so we had the opportunity to talk to the staff. They were friendly and knowledgeable about the exhibits. It also added to the charm that many of them wore period costumes.

It was definitely warm at the blacksmith's!

A depiction of the Nolan River School that was in use in the mid 1800s. 

This 16 foot square log cabin is the original Courthouse of Johnson County. It was built in 1855 for $49. It was moved here later to be part of this outdoor museum.

Inside the Courthouse

Taking a little break

Another highlight was this big grassy area across from our RV site. It was nice to be able to look out the window while eating and see nature rather than another RV. It also made a good walking track for my foot therapy exercises. When we first arrived I was still needing regular exercises to build strength and flexibility. 

At first I only made it part way around. But I kept pushing myself to do a little more each time. It was a red letter day when I got all the way around. John measured it and I think all the way around is a half mile.

Here is another view at sunset.

I hope you enjoyed coming along on our trip!