Bay Landing – Bridgeport, TX

On Friday November 13, we left Midland Basin RV Park at 8:25am. Acey’s mileage 68,072.1 and Thor’s 75,364. We arrived at the Thousand Trails Bay Landing RV Campground on Lake Bridgeport. The park is about 60 miles NW of the Dallas/Fort Worth airport. We have a fairly large site here with 50 amp service but no sewer. We will be here 10 days, so we will need to use the honey wagon service to empty our holding tanks partway thru our stay.

A lovely view from our back porch!

We were treated to a lovely sunset each evening! Thank you Lord!

Our many adventures remind me of the lyrics to one of Linda’s favorite hymns – This is My Father’s World:

  1. This is my Father’s world,
    And to my list’ning ears
    All nature sings, and round me rings
    The music of the spheres.
    This is my Father’s world:
    I rest me in the thought
    Of rocks and trees, of skies and seas—
    His hand the wonders wrought.
  2. This is my Father’s world:
    The birds their carols raise,
    The morning light, the lily white,
    Declare their Maker’s praise.
    This is my Father’s world:
    He shines in all that’s fair;
    In the rustling grass I hear Him pass,
    He speaks to me everywhere.
  3. This is my Father’s world:
    Oh, let me ne’er forget
    That though the wrong seems oft so strong,
    God is the ruler yet.
    This is my Father’s world,
    The battle is not done:
    Jesus who died shall be satisfied,
    And earth and Heav’n be one.

Saturday we drove to the west side Fort Worth and found Airfield Falls Conservation Park, located on the east side of the Naval Air Station.

This piece features some parts from McDonnell Douglas C-9 aircrafts

The park serves as a trailhead for the Trinity Trails; the trails are partially paved.

There were a lot of these berry bushes along the trail as we left the park area – these pathetic plants with purple berries look to be American Beautyberries.

A healthier plant would look like this

Callicarpa americana 2.jpg
By Eric Hunt – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=22069539

There is indeed a nice waterfall that flows over the rocky ledges by the park

This white crane flew off – wish I could have caught it in flight!

Several structures along the Trinity River are part of a mural gallery “Painting the River” (See webite here) designed and painted by several artists – here are 2 that we saw today as we walked along the river bank.

This one is still a work in progress.

It was a beautiful day to be out for a walk!

Later, we zoomed with the family to catch up with everyone – a fun way to do so!

On Sunday, it was our first Sunday back on Central time, so we Zoomed for Sunday School at 9:30. We are studying the first few chapters of Genesis, and this week we pondered over the first 2 chapters that we already studied. The topic today was “This is my Father’s World” Our Creator God not only made the universe but also presides over it! We also tuned in for worship with Stephens Valley Church in Nashville on YouTube, looking into the miracles in the book of Mark. (Full service here— sermon only here)

After lunch, we rode our bikes about 2 miles around the campground. We spotted Acey from across the lake (See yellow arrow?!)

Well that is a bit disturbing!

On Tuesday, we drove to Denton and rode our bikes on another part of the Trinity Trails

Before lunch, we rode to one end of this trail; the commuter train station in Denton.

This paved trail runs along the tracks and had a few street crossings. it was a pretty nice day – we rode to one end, came back to the car and had a picnic lunch, then rode some more – logged a total of 14 miles.

On Wednesday, we went to the Fort Worth Nature Center and Refuge. Apparently you can see Bison there – but they are “off  exhibit for the fall/winter” and the Hardwicke Interpretive Center is closed… The only animal that was on display seemed to be this hawk.

There were several trials to hike, so we looked for them! From an overlook, we could see quite far into the distance and spotted the river.

The limestone ledge was interesting.

The large rocks made a nice stairway as we headed down toward the river. (the sun wouldn’t allow a downhill shot!)

A rather polite way of saying “stay on the trail!”

We made our way to the river and walked along it for a while.

The trails were marked well and were in good shape too.

The water had a lovely sparkling shimmer on it from the sun. but perhaps a camera better than an iPhone would have captured it…

Several ducks and cranes were enjoying the water here on this beautiful day!

Thursday we returned to the trailhead at the Airfield Falls Conservation Park, and rode our bikes on the trail. It was rather windy and about 75F. We rode 13 miles on the paved and gravel path.

Just before we turned around, we got a peek at the downtown Fort Worth skyline. The trail actually goes downtown and beyond!

We saw more of the painted structures, but didn’t stop to get photos. These ducks bid us farewell as we headed back to the parking lot.

Saturday was Linda’s birthday and we drove to Lake Mineral Wells State Park & Trailway. We found a trail that went along part of the shore.

These stairs could take you right down for a swim in the lake!

We saw a crane perched on a dock, but it flew off before we could get a better shot…

It was a pretty trail, but rocky at times!

Linda heard some rustling in the grass near us – and Jim spotted a deer looking at us!

…and two more nearby!

A gorgeous day to be out enjoying nature!

We walked/hiked about 2 miles. We then drove over to the trailhead for the bike trailway – a “rails-to-trails” trail. The road went right along the spillway for the lake – the water was very close to the top of the concrete dam!

This segment of the trail leading from the park to the trailway was a bit gravelly and rough!

Most of the trail was in better shape with a couple of street crossings and a few bridges.

We rode about 8 miles, then drove back to the RV park to shower and go out for a birthday dinner! The Stevens Street Grille was one of the few restaurants in Bridgeport that was not “fast food”. We both had a half-rack of baby back ribs. The dinner also included rolls and a salad. The ribs were delicious – but I couldn’t eat all of mine. The leftovers will be a nice addition to our Sunday homemade pizza on Sunday.

On Sunday, we Zoomed for Sunday School and tuned in for worship with Stephens Valley Church in Nashville on YouTube, Jim did a few maintenance jobs and I worked on the blog – a restful day on our last day here. Our family Zoom moved back o Sunday. For dinner, I made our regular Sunday pizza dinner and used most of the leftover pork from my dinner last night, plus pineapple, tomato, mushrooms, feta, parmesan and mozzarella cheeses.

We put a lot of miles on Thor at this stop – it’s 2 miles just to get to the gate to leave the park and nothing interesting is nearby. That is generally the way it goes when you stay at a Thousand Trails park! In the morning, we will head towards Baton Rouge, with an overnight stop at New Rockdale RV Park in Mansfield, LA, just south of Shreveport, LA.

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