Fort Worth Stockyards

Today we visited the Fort Worth Stockyards in, well Fort Worth, Texas of course. We can not label this a Family Friendly Free-bee because there are too many things to spend money on here. The main reason we went was to see the cattle drive which they do twice a day. It was cool, but a little short. Still the little guys were thrilled to see the real life cowboys and the Texas Longhorns. Blake and Tanner had never seen a Texas Longhorn (the steer, not the college) before, so that was impressive for them.

According to their website - the history of the Stockyards goes back to the drovers heading longhorn cattle up the Chisholm Trail to the railheads, and Fort Worth was the last major stop for rest and supplies. Beyond Fort Worth they would have to deal with crossing the Red River into Indian Territory.

Today the Stockyards are basically a tourist destination with a bit of true cowboy business going on. Mechanical bull rides, Stage coach rides, Cowboy Hall of Fame, Stockyards Museum, Pony rides, Old time photos, shopping area, restaurants, etc.. make this a place a family could blow a ton of cash in a hurry.

We did eat lunch at a nice Tex-Mex place called Habeneros, and gave each family member one thing to do "for a price." The little boys all chose the petting zoo, Blake and Tanner the cowpen maze, Dad chose to have his picture taken on the Longhorn Big Jake and Mom wanted some "Texas fried pickles."

We took advantage of a couple of the free things including a peek at the horse auction going on and the horses for sale in the stockyards. These were actually our favorite things to do there.

On the way back to Howard we stopped by a Roadside America site - the Giant Chromosaurs. These dinos made out of chrome car parts our free to see but sit outside a Ripley's believe it or not "museum." Interesting art.

Brookshire World of Wildlife Museum

Our Family Friendly Free-bee today is in Tyler, Texas. It is a little museum called the Brookshire World of Wildlife Museum. It is a little museum filled with real wild animals that have been stuffed and are displayed in their natural surroundings along with little plaques given information about each species. Many of the animals are from Africa, but there are also representatives from the Arctic as well as right here in North America. It’s an interesting way to see some of the details in animals that you would not be able to see in a zoo setting.
After the rooms of animals, there is a replica of an old country store that your family can walk through. This was very interesting to our children…especially the candy counter. The most interesting thing to me was the prices that were listed on the items in the store. (Those were the good old days indeed.) Of course, to a family whose father is absolutely crazy about Coca-cola memorabilia, the day wouldn’t have been complete without strolling through the hall way devoted to Coke in all it’s glory.
Finally, you end up in the outdoor playground. It is completely fenced in and child friendly. They have all the trappings you would expect to find in an outdoor playground, but they have also added a few little surprises, including an old train caboose, a real fire truck and a retired tractor. All these are displayed for the sole purpose of allowing children to climb and explore them. All in all, it’s a pretty well rounded little stop. Education and physical activity all wrapped up in one neat little museum. Our boys gave it 5 thumbs up, but if you happen to have an aversion to taxidermy, you might want to think twice about strolling through the first part of the museum.

Campground review - Tyler State Park

We are wrapping up three fun days in Tyler State Park in Texas. Tyler is about an hour and half east of Dallas. We really enjoyed our time here

Cleanliness - 7

Bathrooms - 7 - they were mostly clean, and the showers were very warm, very hard to turn on without getting doused (this is only a concern if you are helping a little one take a shower). Also no soap in the bathrooms

Facility fun - 9 - Lots to do here including free fishing without license. Nice playground and small beach area. Boat rentals and lots of hiking. Kids rode bikes and scooters

everywhere. David caught his first ever fish here!

Facility usefulness - 7 - Dump station, but they also have full hook-ups so no need to use it. Little store site.
Nearby attractions - 5 - Not a lot to do in Tyler from what we could see.

Staff - 7 - Polite and average in helpful department.

Natural surroundings - 8 - Lots of trees, and great little lake and some wildlife.

Roominess 9 - Huge central area, not very crowded at all.

Value - 8 - we paid $26 a night. This included $3 a day for park passes for each adult

Overall - 8

Armadillo spotting - Tyler State Park

We have spotted several of these little guys where we are staying at the Tyler State Park. No big deal for the locals I'm sure, but lots of fun for us. We all think they are cute and Blake wants one for a pet. Chase calls them "Farmadillos" and corrects us when we say it right. Wise in his own eyes?

Texas McDonalds

For our 2nd state in our 50 states/50 McDonald's we stopped at a Golden Arches in Tyler, Texas (we are staying near here for a few days). This was a new Mickey Ds and was very clean. They have Star Wars toys and Strawberry Shortcake toys, so with each Happy Meal I had to state they were all boys.

Blake has gotten too hungry for a Happy Meal anymore, but he is 13 now. Another little phenomena when you order for seven people, you get asked "Is that all?" a lot! I have started to pre-warn to register folks with "This is a big order" or "I have five sons."

BTW - I had the angus swiss mushroom burger. This burger and their coffees have renewed my childhood infatuation with McDonalds.

The Chocolate Factory in Joplin, MO

OK, today’s family free-bee was not only fun, it was delicious. Our family decided to stop today in Joplin, Missouri and take a free tour of The Chocolate Factory. I have to say that I was impressed with more than just the tour. It seems that the company usually only gives tours at 10:30 am and 1:30 pm, but we showed up about 2:40 pm, unknowing that we had missed the tours for the day. Not only did they go ahead and give us the candy tour, but we were shown around by none other than the owner of the store.Now, the tour was great. I never knew how much went into making chocolate candies. They had all the huge copper pots that I expected to see, and they even used the conveyor belt system that Lucy and Ethel made famous in the old I Love Lucy episode. (We were informed by one of the ladies that work there that they didn’t get the belt moving quite that fast.) They showed us the entire process.

We even learned that they have a metal detector that all the ingredients have to go through before they can be sold. Rest assured that no chocolate or candy from this store will contain even a trace of any metal.After seeing and smelling row upon row of fine candies, we came to the end of our tour.

My sons were pretty excited that they got to keep their little hair nets, but little did they know that the best was yet to come. It seems the tour ends with a special treat of chocolate dipped cookies for all. The boys gave the whole experience 5 yummy thumbs up. My husband and I purchased our own chocolate favorites. He devoured a bag of chocolate covered peanuts while I savored the most amazing turtles I have ever eaten. That part wasn’t free, but I think it was worth every penny.

Table Rock State Park

Sorry, this mpost has been taken down because it is in our book detailing our trip across America!

 

Campground review - Stagecoach RV Campground

We found a gem of a campground near Branson called the Stagecoach RV Campground. See the review below.

Cleanliness - 9

Bathrooms - 8 - they were very clean, and the showers were warm, but there were only two.

Facility fun - 6 - Miniscule playground. Nice pool, but it was closed for the season.

Facility usefulness - 9 - Dump station, very nice laundry facility, propane plus a restaurant on site.

Nearby attractions - 10 - Branson and Table Rock State Park.

Staff - 9 - Very friendly and doubly helpful.

Natural surroundings - 7 - Table Rock Lake and State Park across the street.

Roominess 7 - Average size sites on concrete slabs.

Value - 9 - we paid $23 a night for everything including cable with our Passport America card.

Overall - 9

Family Friendly Free-bees - Missouri

By PatsyI have decided to add a small

feature t

o this blog. As we travel through the US, I will be on a mission to find family friendly attractions that cost absolutely nothing. I’m fairly certain that I will miss most of these, since we will not be able to make it to every city in the US, but I thought I would still at least let you know about the ones that we do find.
Our first Family Friendly Free-bee is in the great state of Missouri. The Table Rock State Park near Branson has a cool fish hatchery. (Actually, the state park itself is free, but the fish hatchery is something a little more unique.) We took the boys to see the fish and before we even got outside to the hatching tanks, they were thrilled with the huge trout in the indoor aquariums.Outside, there are many large holding tanks for the trout to breed and grow. It seems they start out as tiny fish swimming all together, and then, as they grow, they are separated out to other tanks in order to give them more room to grow. We went from tank to tank trying to decide which tank had the biggest fish. The boys really enjoyed that.
But the most fun was when they realized that these fish were really, really hungry. And, joy of all joys, they got to feed them. OK, so this part isn’t exactly free. You do have to pay a quarter for a handful of fish food, but I am still counting it as a free-bee, because most of my boys scoured the ground along the edges of the tanks and collected more than enough dropped fish pellets to give those fish a good feeding. They would gather as much food as they could and then drop one pellet at a time in the tank watching those fish jump over each other trying to be the first to the food.
The 5 Martin boys have given this attraction 5 thumbs-up. It has also received the Mom and Dad seal of approval. However, be aware that the outdoor holding tanks are at ground level and though most of them are covered with nets to keep out the birds, you may want to hold hands of your more adventurous little explorers.

Noah - Site and Sounds Theater

Sorry, but this post has been deleted because it is a part of our new book called Napkin Dreams!

 

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Pin Oak Park Campground Review

We needed a an RV park close to St Louis so we picked Pin Oak RV Park. There were no Passport America parks close enough for us.

Cleanliness - 6

Bathrooms - 5 - they were clean but outdated, the showers were warm!

Facility fun - 6 - they have a pond for fishing, mini-putt and a pool (closed in late Sept).

Facility usefulness - 8 - Dump station, laundry facility, camp store, full-hook-ups, propane.

Nearby attractions - 9 - St. Louis is a half-hour away, six flags 15 minutes.

Staff - 8 - Camp hosts were great. Guy cleaning the bathroom was too.

Natural surroundings - 7 - Shaded with trees and a nice pond.

Roominess 6 - Normal size pull-through sites, not crowded during a September week day.

Value - 5 - we paid $37 a night for full hook-up.

Overall - 6

St Louis

Yesterday we visited St Louis and most precisely the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial - otherwise known as the The Arch. Everyone but Patsy rode up in the little space age pod to the top and we were treated with a nice view on a gorgeous fall afternoon. Then we went through the museum underneath the arch and the boys did their first junior ranger program. They do have programs for teens, but our teen has decided from now on he is going to help his brothers with their junior ranger programs at National Parks.

Enjoy the photos.