Road Trip 2025: Day 27

Though we all started the night in our hammocks, at some point, Kati moved into the car and G3 got out his sleeping pad and pillow and laid down on the sand. Sometime after midnight, I got chilly, put on a sweatshirt and covered myself with a beach towel. I slept, but not well. I just wasn’t tired. The moon was up and three quarters full, so it never got dark. I woke up early to watch the sun rise. G3 had asked me to wake him, so I did, and we sat on the dune together—his head on my shoulder because he was tired—watching the sky lighten and turn pink before the sun poked itself up over the sand.

I tried to go back to sleep but couldn’t, so I got up and took a shower. Since we didn’t have all that much planned for the day, I didn’t push for an early start. By the time we all finished with showers it was late. We didn’t get on the road until almost 10:00.

And today—the reason we decided to detour into Texas—we visited the George Bushes’ house in Midland. Two presidents, one house. Very exciting. Except the tour was rather blah. You all know G3 is trying to get to every president’s house. Adding two more today, he is up to 38–not bad.

Generally, historic presidents—the ones before my time—are more exciting than modern day presidents, predominantly because they are no longer alive and there is more to learn. I lived through both Bushes terms in office and remember Baby Bush all too well. But still, I had hoped the tour guide would have shared some behind the scenes stories, stories of life before the white house and she didn’t—not really.

When Papa Bush ran for office the second time—and lost to Clinton—I was a freshman in college, and old enough to vote. I did not vote for Bush, but my dad—who was still a Republican—did. Eight years later, when Baby Bush ran, neither of us voted for him. I believe it was the first time Dad voted for a Democrat in a presidential election.

I did not know that George and Barbara Bush had six children—five of whom lived into adulthood. Baby Bush and Jeb are the only ones we hear about, probably because they are the two who followed in their father’s political footsteps. Their second child (and eldest daughter) died just before her fourth birthday. One day she told her mother that all she wanted to do was lay in the grass and watch the cars go by. Her mother thought this odd behavior for a child and took her to the doctor. He diagnosed her with late stage leukemia. Not surprisingly, her death devastated her mother.

Baby Bush’s dream as a child was to play baseball professionally. Unfortunately, he wasn’t very good. His father, Papa Bush played for Yale, but in this case, the apple fell far from the tree. However, Baby Bush did have one of the most valuable and expensive baseball card collections as a child. Each time he got a new card, he’d mail it to the player and ask him to sign it. Willie Mays was he favorite player.

G3 immediately noticed the Cub Scout shirt on the bed in what was Baby Bush’s room. The tour guide said that Barbara Bush was his den mother, but he apparently didn’t like scouts all that much since he was not involved with Boy Scouts.

Practically nothing in the house was original, although in most cases they tried to at least make everything fit the 1950s. Some things, however, were so obviously out of place that they would have been better off having nothing. For instance, there were two metal folding chairs at the kitchen table that looked misplaced. This prompted Kati to  asked if the Bush family regularly sat on folding chairs. The tour guide said no, which frustrated Kati. She could not understand why they would opt to have crappy folding chairs instead of no chairs at all. It also really troubled her that the backyard fence was in such serious disrepair that it appeared as if one strong wind might knock it down.

After our disappointing and not very enlightening tour at the Bushes’ house, we drove—actually I drove because Kati wasn’t feeling well after her miserable night of no sleep—four plus hours to Stonewall. Why would we drive to a town no one outside of Texas has ever heard of? I’ll give you one guess. Go ahead, take a minute and think about it. I’ll give you a hint, The Bushes are not the only presidents from Texas. Yep, you got it. LBJ lived here too, but we got here after his house closed for the day, so he is on our itinerary for tomorrow

Even though we didn’t arrive early enough to visit LBJ, we arrived in time for a tasting at Arrowhead Creek Winery. The only winery in the area open after 6:00. And you know Kati, nothing pairs better with a president’s house than a wine tasting. We were the only ones there, which is always my preference for everything. The fewer people the better. The owner was extremely talkative and enjoyed telling stories about himself and his winery. He, his wife, his daughter, and son-in-law bought the winery two and a half years ago. They kept the name given to the winery by the previous owner because arrowheads are significant to the property. One night, after a few beers, the owner and his son-in-law went outside and started digging. It did not take them long to uncover several arrowheads. What followed was a two year passion project. They tore up a patch of property and uncovered dozes of arrowheads and other tools. The land upon which the winery sits was once upon a time a tribal camp. Native American tribes lived there going back between 10,000 and 12,000 years. The most recent tribes who have inhabited the area were the Kiowa, Comanche, and Apache.

The winery is pro military. Both of the owners sons-in-law are in the military. Therefore, some of his wines have a military theme. One of his wines honors the Women Air-force Service Pilots from World War II. Another wine honors the Tuskegee Airmen. One wall in one of the tasting rooms is covered in military patches. The winery invites service men and women to donate a patch to the wall. All service people who do so are given a free glass of wine.

Throughout our conversation, the owner told us he is an Eagle Scout and in his youth he did go to Philmont. While Kati and I were tasting wine and getting a history lesson, G3 was playing with the friendly and playful black lab who lives on the winery. G3 and the dog took a walk down to the river.

I think they both had fun.

We arrived at the winery just after 6:00 and figured we’d stay maybe an hour at most. We ended up staying for more than two hours. By 8:30, when we left, it was already getting dark and we had not yet eaten dinner. Since there were no campsites in the area—we had initially planned to drive another half hour east—Kati went online and booked a really cheap hotel in Fredericksburg, a town that was initially settled by Germans.