150 Milestone

28 November

Last night was the 150th night that Sprinty has been camping this year.

Woke up to 42 degrees with no golf planned for the day.  First order of business for the day, after breakfast and coffee, was to visit the park office to settle up.  We got there just before 8am, and the ranger opened up early so we could pay for our campsite last night.  We complemented them on the great bathhouse - super clean, and very nice showers.

We then headed for Austin to visit the Lyndon Baines Johnson (LBJ) Presidential Library and Museum.  We encounter typical rush hour traffic, something we have managed to stay out of this trip.  Traffic moved and Google Maps did a great job navigating us to Parking Lot No. 38 on the University of Texas at Austin campus, the parking lot set aside for LBJ Museum visitors.  Researching ahead of time, we learned we needed a parking pass if our vehicle took up more than one parking space. 

After getting our parking pass and placing it on the dash, we proceeded to tour the museum.  The staff volunteer was very thorough in explaining the arrangement of the exhibits and suggested way to proceed.  We started with the introduction video.

The LBJ presidential Library also was hosting the “Get in the Game: The Fight for Equality in American Sports” Exhibition.  As it was located near the entrance, we toured the exhibit which examines social justice and sports in the United States. The exhibition celebrates athletes who have broken barriers and fought for equality, both on and off the playing field.

Next was the LBJ timeline which chronicled his life and major historical events.  It wrapped around three long walls.  Then you ascended a dominate staircase in  the Great Hall, an atrium-type feature, to the next floor.  Looking up on one end, you could see the four or five floors of archival book shelves through walls of glass which contain the 65 million documents stored there.  Photo is of the great seal on the opposite wall:

Major exhibits on the fourth floor were his life in politics, transition to power, civil rights, Great Society, space program, foreign policy, and the Vietnam War.  A couple of items we found quite interesting items were his goals:

And list of major legislation passed:

LBJ also recorded many of his phone calls, and some of the recordings are now part of the exhibits.  Picking up a telephone handset and pressing a button, you were able to eavesdrop on portions of phone calls he made with various people on a variety of subjects.  No doubt the exhibit samples were carefully selected, but in the few we listed to, he was clearly on transmit with whomever was on the call, and seemed to dominate the call.

On the 10th floor, they had a replica (7/8ths scale) of the Oval Office as it looked when he was in office.  Unlike the George H.W. Bush Library/Museum, the Presidential desk is not accessible for people to sit at or have their picture taken.  Maybe because our unwillingness to submit to being reduced to 7/8ths scale?  So use your imagination for the executive pose that Kris or Darrell might have assumed had we been able to sit at the desk:

Also on the 10th floor were a few exhibits about the First Lady, Lady Bird Johnson.  It also had her office where she worked in the many years after the Library was built in 1971 until her passing.

We spent about 3 hours at the Library/Museum and were struck with how many things were done in those few years.  Many we thought had preceded him.  A key chord throughout the exhibits was his fierce determination to make this country better for all Americans and how the plight of his students as a school teacher in rural Texas in the 1920s shaped his priorities.

We then took the Texas Hill Country Trail towards San Antonio to Canyon Lake.  Our AllStays app showed several options for camping, so our first stop was the Joint Base San Antonio Canyon Lake Recreation Park (military base RV park).  Our first challenge was just entering the recreation area as it was gated and no one at the gate.  While there was a number to call, before we could call, a security guy rolled up and opened the gate for us.  We got a site for the night, got settled, then took a nice hike around the recreation area.  We noticed the deer seem quite used to people, and Darrell was able to get within about 30 feet to get a photo:

Photo of afternoon sun on Sprinty: