Wednesday, January 23, 2013

Fredericksburg, TX–Jan 23–26, 2013

Fredericksburg RV Park

Our drive down to Fredericksburg was on a pleasant two lane country road most of the way.  Light traffic except for the crude oil tank trucks that were everywhere,  either in front of  us, slowing us down or in back of us, pushing from behind.

Looking south at downtown Fredericksburg. The view we saw as we enter into town. You can see the National Museum of the Pacific War complex at the end of block under the US flag.

IMG_1668

The Nimitz Hotel was built in 1852 and was know as the Steamboat Hotel because of the ship's bow front. Remodeled many times, at one time had a flat façade but has since been restored to the ship’s bow.

 

We drove down the main street, through the downtown to Fredericksburg RV Park located a little south of town.  The park is on a slight slope and the sites are slightly terraced at our end, level but somewhat close together .  We are surrounded by 5th wheel toy haulers all carrying 3 wheel motorcycles.  They belong to a club which came down to Texas hill country to ride the back roads. 

We started our exploring at the The National Museum of the Pacific War-George Bush Gallery and the Nimitz Hotel museum complex.  The lady at the ticket counter explained the areas including the availability of a guided tour of The Pacific Combat Zone, where the struggle for the islands of the Pacific took place.  She said the exhibits were located about a 15 to 20 minute walk from the museum.  She also noted that our tickets were good for 48 hours, a point I felt was unimportant as I felt one day in a museum would be more that enough.  I was proven wrong. The museum is the best I have ever experienced. So good in fact, we did return the next day to finish up.

Starting in the morning at their opening time, we decided to start with a walk down to the The Pacific Combat Zone. It turned out the walk was much shorter that we were advised and only maybe took 5 minute. We arrived about 15 minutes before the start of the tour.   Debbie aims an anti-aircraft gun below while we wait for the tour to start.

IMG_1623

The Pacific Combat Zone was an indoor/outdoor exhibit which included restored WWII military vehicles and weaponry in a realistic setting including; docks, entrenchments and beachheads.

IMG_1625

IMG_1635

IMG_1636             IMG_1646

We then walked back and entered the Nimitz hotel museum. We sat down and watched a very informative video about the Nimitz history.

Afterward we walked down to the Der Lindenbaum German Restaurant. The restaurant and is located in a beautiful historic limestone building built German pioneers who founded Fredericksburg over a century ago.

IMG_1670

Jager Schnitzel piled two deep. Having worked up an appetite with all the walking, I ate it all.

IMG_1666

After lunch we returned to The National Museum of the Pacific War-George Bush Gallery and spent the rest of the day there. This is the best museum we have ever been in. My usual endurance in a museum is a couple of  hours max, but we didn’t finish and had to return the next morning.

At noon the next day we drove down to the Catfish Haven.  Mmmm fried catfish.  Was excellent.

IMG_1697

After lunch we took a walk downtown. This variety store brought back some long ago memories.

IMG_1713

After lunch we drove out to Lynden B Johnson Ranch. We got there just in time to go through the visitor center and then we drove out to the the ranch house which still has a large plane parked in a hanger next to the ranch house.

Next San Antonio.

No comments:

About Us

The Normans are Debbie, Jim and Ty the cat. The Horizon is our Itasca Horizon Motorhome. We spend the summers in cool northern Washington and travel through the warm south during the winter. We spend time in the spring and fall at our home in northern California as we pass by by.

Visited States

Visited States