Tuesday, October 29, 2013

WRAPPING IT UP IN GOLIAD, TX

Sunday, October 27 – The River Hiking trail in Goliad State Park was on today's agenda. It follows the San Antonio River along the outer edge of the park. It covers about 3 miles in mostly wooded areas.

Goliad hike

hike

hike

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hike

Along the walk we came across a huge area of not three- but FOUR-leaf clover. We have never seen so many in one spot. This must be our lucky day

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It is such a peaceful hike. Even though the tail runs along the San Antonio River, we didn't see the River all that much.

San Antonio river

We didn't see much wildlife either except HUGE grasshoppers....things are definitely bigger in Texas!

grasshopper

There were also numerous turkey vultures soaring in the sky and roosting in the trees. I think they knew we didn't take any water on our hike..... :-)

There is another trail called the Angel of Goliad trail. It is a 2.5 mile hike. In one direction it took us to the Angel of Goliad Statue and in the other direction to downtown Goliad.

Historical accounts refer to the "Angel of Goliad" as a lady of Mexican birth named Francisca Alavéz . She is often referred to as the wife of Captain Telesforo Alavéz who was commander of Mexican Centralista forces. On March 20, Major William P. Miller and his 75 men were captured and moved to Presidio La Bahia. The prisoners were bond so tightly it cut off circulation. They were deprived of food and water. The "Angel of Goliad" helped save the lives of many of these men. Several of the men that survived recalled that she pleaded for their lives, helped sneak out some troops at night and hid some of the men. She also tended to wounds and sending messages and provisions to those still imprisoned.

Angel of Goliad

Landing Gear Problem:  Paul has noticed the last two times we setup that the 5th wheel would not level correctly. Upon inspection, he determined the landing gear were not deploying at the same rate. One was going down twice as fast as the other. Time for closer inspection.

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Oh no....now the slower jack would not store! Paul hooked-up the truck and with the help of a friendly neighbor, began chopping out the wooden block he placed under the jack when setting up. It wasn't easy, but they finally removed the block and the jack was free.

jack

jack

Paul dismantled the jack and was able to get it working again, but it was still deploying slower than its partner. At least it stores and we can use it enough until we can find a place to get it repaired. Anyone ever have a similar problem and know the cause?

jack

Many of the blogs we read are containing gorgeous photos of the fall colors. In case anyone out there would like to see the fall colors in this area of Texas, here is a photo for you…..not so gorgeous.

fall leaves in TX

We really enjoyed our three days in Goliad. If you are traveling in this area, be sure to stop and enjoy this historic town.

Thanks for stopping by. Hope to see y'all back real soon. Have a great day.

15 comments:

  1. I haven't had the problem, but at one of the RV Parks we were at someone couldn't get one front Jack up. It turned out to be a broken pin where the drive motor goes over to the right side. As I remember, his shaft had broken the end off. He had to take it up manually, and would have to replace the shaft.
    Ray

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  2. Seeing the crossover shaft ahead of Paul in the one picture tells me the Landing Gear Jacks have a single drive motor. What has probably happened is the pinion gears on the crossover shaft have worn and are not contacting the crown gear properly or if the jack is not moving at all now you have severed a shear pin. Hope that helps a bit. It might be easier to replace the jack. Be Safe and Enjoy!

    It's about time.

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  3. Looks like an interesting place. We may want to swing by after our time in Rockport. Hope you guys get the jacks figured out. 2 years ago when our rig was new, we had a motor problem, but it was effecting both sides. Good luck!

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  4. So far our levels have been doing a great job. We want them to continue doing so too. We don't like repair jobs!! Never heard of the little town of Goliad but it sure would be interesting to visit there.

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  5. Sorry about your jack. Always frustrating when things don't work right. And I'm always excited when we take off to go someplace without problems. Goliad sure sounds like a stop to put on our list if we ever get to TX.

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  6. What a lovely walk on the River Hiking Trail! How unusual to see so many 4-leaf clovers in one place! So sorry to hear about the jack problem. Don't know about you, but there if that were us, there'd be no serenity until it was fixed permanently and all was right with our world again. :-D

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  7. Thanks for sharing your Fall colors there, Marsha.

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  8. Good luck with you landing gear repair and have a safe travel day today.

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  9. I don't know if yours are the same as ours. Ours has a bolt that goes through the drive shaft, it broke. I had to take the wall out inside of the bay area to get to it. Not a hard fix after I got the wall removed. When the bolt broke, one jack would go up the other down. I ran the jacks till they were about even then replaced the bolt.
    We hiked that trail both ways many times, real nice.

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  10. Looked like a great trail with a good up with those steps. Don't you love river trails that you can't see the river! I guess hearing it is better than the river trials in AZ where there isn't any river! That was one colorful but large grasshopper!

    Great story with the Angel of Goliad.

    Hope all works out with your jacks. That is not a fun thing to have go bad. Been there with our electric jacks.

    Enjoy Houston and have a great time with Carrie. It will be nice that she has a few weeks off while you are there. Sounds like "girl time."

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  11. Maybe it's not so bad that I don't have levelers. I've been really lucky to get fairly level parking spots. It helps that my rig is short so I can move back and forth in most spots to see what is most level.

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  12. I should have mentioned earlier having a hydraulic bottle jack also helps when needing to raise and lower the trailer when a jack refuses to work. Glad my suggestion helped you out. Be Safe and Enjoy!

    It's about time.

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  13. I have a feeling that someone planted Shamrock. Looks like what I bought around St. Patrick's Day

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  14. We did have some jack issues with our last RV, but only when we sat in a cold area. When we put a small heater in the basement area 30 minutes before we tried to lift the hydraulic jacks, they worked fine. Hope you get this resolved soon.

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  15. Seems like it is always something with our homes on wheels.

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