Poop and horses and an attack!

On our last day at Lazy Palm Ranch we went to the Lower Rio Grande Valley Wildlife Refuge nearby. The plan was to walk along the path to La Sal Del Rey.
I looked at the map on the internet and thought I knew where to go to get close to the lake. Well, we found a gate with a small entrance for pedestrians, so we parked and went in.

At the entrance

Once on the path I felt very apprehensive because there was a lot of unknown scat, and it was not all deer or other antelope droppings. some of it looked like a big cat type animal.

We saw a beautiful Green Jay (no photo) and some other birds and lots of poop.

Unknown poop!

It did not look like dog poop because it was full of hair.

The road stretched away into the distance.

This was a huge pile of deer or Nilgai poop.

Anyway, we decided to go back to the gate and drive around to another parking area where we had seen some cars parked. As Michael was reversing to turn around, he saw what looked like a large cat. It was not a Bobcat because it had a long heavy tail. We drove slowly toward where he had seen it, but it had already gone into the bush and disappeared. Later we looked at some photos and decided that it was an Ocelot. There are only 50 left in Southern Texas.
We headed back about 2 miles and pulled into the other parking lot and read the signs about the salt lakes. Instead of repeating what they said, I'll just publish the photos here.

Very interesting, so off we set once again to try and get to the salt lake. About half a mile up the road we were attacked! By mosquitoes! Swarms of them. It was impossible to go any further, so without seeing the lake, we retraced our steps and went back to Lazy Palms Ranch.

On the way back we stopped off at the little ranch across the road and chatted with the horses.

By the way, this was the only warm day we had while we were camped there.

Posted with Blogsy

A Thorny Issue and a Review of Lazy Palms Ranch.

We are at Lazy Palms Ranch RV Resort, Texas.

Campground Review

For our week out of Tropic Winds we travelled about 50 miles away to Lazy Palms Ranch RV Resort, a Coast to Coast Resort so it is costing us only $10 a night. Just as well, because this not a park that we would like to spend too much time at. Even a week was going to be a stretch!

We had booked into a Coast to Coast park in Brownsville, but cancelled the reservation before the whole brou-ha-ha at Tropic Winds with our Thousand Trails membership. When I went back to rebook the site it was gone, so we settled on this place that had a lot of empty space. Now we know why.

This place is infested with some kind of burrs in the grass. Poor Timmy could not walk on the "grass" and even on the road there were burrs which got into his paws. He has learned to remove them himself, but it must be very painful.

The sites are huge, but there is no pad to park on. Just the weeds, including the burr grass.  When it rains it looks as if the sites just turn into mud. The roads here are all dirt and after a little bit of rain they turned into muddy messes.

Good things about the park is the beautiful pool area, free wifi and low monthly rates, including free electricity.

This campground is way out in the boonies, about 20 miles north of Edinburg. The nearest supermarket is 22 miles away. 

We took a wrong turn and came to the campground from the north. The road down to the park was dirt and very narrow. More scratches from overhanging branches!

We are in the distance, to the left of the Entrance Gate

Our view out the front windshield. Not exactly picturesque.

The sites are huge, but pretty much unusable because of the burrs.

Huge sites

Main road down the centre of the campground. All roads are dirt and after rain, turn into a muddy mess.

Burrs in Michael's bike tires from riding across the weeds on the site.

Two flat tires

Lots of empty spaces. 

Close up of the weeds on the sites. Full of burrs

Fishing pond.

TV area inside the Rec Hall. 

Kitchen 

Rec Hall

Hundred of books.

Just as well there are lots of books. Not much else to do here.

Jigsaw puzzles

Shuffleboard

The best thing in the the park was the pool area

Spanish influence seen in the wrought iron gate

Bocce 

Horseshoes

Lovely flowering cactus.

This is the registration office!

Welcome to Lazy Palms

The laundry and bath house need a lick of paint.

Dryers. Old but functional.

Same with the washing machines. $1 a load.

We are officially in The Future!

Check the date, from the movie "Back to the Future"!

Update to the update!!

WooHoo!

We were going to add the North East Zone to our Thousand Trails membership at some point. Well, we decided to do it now while we are here, thereby getting this park as one of our parks and adding 14 parks to our membership. So, after our week out, we will be coming back to another 2 weeks at $3 a night.

We now have parks in Maine, Massachussetts, New Jersey, New York, and Pennsylvania.

What we are going to save by not going to full pay parks down here will pretty much pay for the upgrade.