Chili cook off (Part I) / camping trip

Entrance to camp ground

Last year, my husband and I attended the Annual Chili Cook off in Terlingua, Texas. It is a week long festival with a chili cook off competition at the end of the week.  This year, my husband made the trip without me.  Last weekend, he went to Terlingua and met his dad who has been attending and judging for some 15 plus years.

The cook off last year was fun.  We met some interesting people and because my father in-law is a regular (every body knows and loves Harry), he gets invited to many little parties at different camp sites thru the week long festival.  We of course tagged along and ate and drank beyond our hearts content.  Each night there was a live country band and an actual dance floor (area)! It would have been awesome had I had someone to dance with.  Despite my husband's pride in being a Texan (lord he teases me about my Yankee ways - I was transplanted in San Antonio in my teens) , HE DOES NOT dance to country music.

Harry took with him last year his giant telescope, which in an open range with a starlit canopy sky was an amazing treat. A big difference from sky gazing in the city. Last year the long drive to Terlingua was a nice way to connect with my husband.  We love car trips, and taking pictures along the way is one of our favorite things.  This year after having made the drive before, the thought of spending eight hours in a car to get there and eight hours back of a three-day weekend was a bit of a nightmare.  I have been exhausted for the better part of two months and such a long drive did not fit in to my idea of resting.

Anyways, the festival is held in the desert on a few acres of land where you bring in all you will need for the time you are there and then you must take it all back! (You know, CAMPING!)  There is no running water, there are also no rivers, no creeks, or bodies of water available so a good shower/bath to scrub all the dirt and grime from the dusty desert at the end of the day won't happen.  My father in-law has a nice little trailer equipped with bathroom, kitchen, sleeping quarter, and tiny living area.  It is perfect except that I don't think it gets vacuumed or scrubbed down often.  Thank goodness I am a bit of a clean freak and travel with wet wipes because I spent a good 15 minutes cleaning the bathroom and another 15 cleaning the kitchen before I felt at ease there.  All my discomfort I held in and I tried to make the best of it.  By the way, I did my cleaning when my father in law wasn't around, but it was obvious that I had cleaned. This year all those memories flashed thru my head and made me squirm.

There are fleets of mobile homes camping thru the grounds fully equipped and if I camped out that way in the desert I would be more willing to return.  There are also plenty of tents in between, but I just couldn't see me roughing it like that in the desert. There is running water in the trailer we camped in, but there was a mishap on the drive down last year. My father in-law was pulling the trailer and not even a hour from home he had a major blow out.  It was so bad that it tore a huge gash half the length of the trailer. Now most people would have gotten a quick fix and turned back home.  Not Harry; he got a quick fix and continued on the remaining 4 hours of his trip to the chili festival. The repercussions of the blow out turned out to be more than what was visible at the time and we all suffered ..