First, I thought I’d give a brief description of the Flying L. The ranch has been around for a while but it looks like they are adding units and amenities in the effort to grow their business. We stayed at their time share units booked through my parents membership in ICE. These are new condo style units that seem to be less than 5 years old. They also have older villas that are duplexes available for bookings to the general public. They have a nice 18 hole golf course, a kids activity program on a pay per day basis and evening entertainment included with all accommodations. They have two pools, an older traditional pool and a brand new water park with slides, a wave pool and a lazy river. The thing that tickled us, though, is that Bandera Proper has a smaller population at just under 2000 than what we tend to call the Sonoita area, which is really all of Eastern Santa Cruz County. It really was , for us, like going to a “Big Town” to go to a dude ranch. Eastern Santa Cruz county is around 2000 people, and I’m sure Bandera county must be over 5000 people. Heck, Bandera actually has a grocery store, a Radio Shack, and a Church’s Fried Chicken.
Another nice amenity in Bandera is the USA’s second oldest Polish Catholic Church, St. Stanislov’s. This beautiful church was where we attended Easter Sunday services. On Saturday night, we started off the holiday by decorating eggs, and on Sunday we got to church early so we could all sit together. The only problem was that for the Easter services they had added an extra Spanish mass, so instead of the English mass being at 11:00, it was pushed out to 11:30. Not really a big deal, we took our family pictures before Mass and also toured the historic Cemetery. After Mass, we headed back to the condo’s to change for the Crosby Family Picnic at Cousin Dixie’s in Bourne, TX. Our family hadn’t been out to the annual event since before Sean and Savannah were born. It was a really nice chance to catch up with distant cousins I hadn’t seen in a while and enjoy the wonderful food everyone brought. Sunday night was a quiet night where we mostly either watched TV or visited.
Monday was our big Bandera Shopping day. Steve, Sean, big David and Brett all stayed at the camp site and did a little fishing and computer work, while Anne, Mary Fran and I took the girls and little David shopping in Bandera. They had lots of Western themed gift shops. Mom had given each of us $25 from her small inheritance from Mama Frances so that we could all buy something by which to remember her and the reunion week. Savannah knew that she wanted to get a Webkins horse and name him Bandito. She was thrilled when she found a shop with a huge “We Sell Webkins” sign. She found a horse just like she wanted.
That evening, we had a picnic dinner at the RV park with Cajun Barbecued shrimp and a nice salad. The shrimp is actually baked in an oven but covered in a wonderful ketchup, Worcestershire, olive oil and lemon sauce. Mary Fran was able to fit a huge pan of shrimp right in her RV oven. The weather was perfect for out door dining.
Coming soon: Part III San Antonio: The River Walk and the Alamo.
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