Texas Chainsaw Massacre....

Let it be known that if I say "American(s)" I mean USA citizens from this day forward.

We made it into Texas,,only just,,, as the Colombia bridge crossing at Laredo is about as organised as a student rally..The Mexico immigration is on the "way in" side of the road so you need to go round to there to get your deposit back for the car and do the passports. However DON'T do through the toll gate onto the bridge to get round. Just dump the car on the grass and walk. Otherwise you end up paying the bridge toll twice, like we did! There are no signs or anything to tell you to stop at the little white hut on the side of the road to cancel the deposit let alone to then go to the other office to get you money back. So, stop at the little hut, cancel your car paperwork then park up and walk over to the office. There is a car park near the office so you could sort of drive round without parking on the grass.

We've been staying in the Texas State Parks at Lake Casa Blanca, Goliad and Stephen Austin parks. They are not cheap but they do have showers. Strange thing is the BIG RVs they all drive have showers so they don't need them. However the camping fraternity (like us) in tents (or other low tech rides) do need showers and all the shower blocks are in the RV park and not in near the camping sites. This is completely the wrong way round. The showers should be near the Camping spots ! Its not rocket science but this is America and some things are just how they are.

The staff at the parks are really nice and there has hot been such a fancy check in process since South Africa....Hi guys, if you are reading this !

Another example of how it is here is the tax they add on to everything. Rather than have the price including tax (which is the law in the UK) they add it on later so everything is more expensive than is ticketed. Why they cannot show the price including tax on the ticket and then show you the tax on the receipt I will never understand. No doubt there's some cockamamie logic that the Americans  will use in argument but I'm not listening. A price should be a price unless you are running a business to business supply/service and then you can show the price without tax. This is the way in Europe and the UK and this is logical (captain).

We met the big brother of the Armadillo I squashed in South America. He was pretty OK with his photo shoot until he came up and sniffed my foot...he then bolted off at light speed. I wonder why ?

Mother arrives tomorrow.....