January 30th to February 12th, 2022
We've been full-time RVing in our Newmar Dutch Star 4369 motor home since September of 2021. Before that, we camped at lots of campgrounds in Colorado and all of the neighboring states. When we stayed at Hickory Creek Campground in Hickory Creek, Texas, we found one of our favorite campgrounds. It's almost perfect!
We were right on Lewisville Lake, a big lake that everyone kept telling us was "Death Lake" in the summer because it's one, big, drunken party. People are drowning and dying left and right, apparently. But we were there in the winter, and it was mellow. It even snowed on us a little bit.
Margot put the boat in the water and brought it around to the shore by our site. She bought waders and used them to get out to the boat in the chilly February water. We went out together, and she went out on her own. Though we were there for two weeks, the weather didn't cooperate, and we didn't get out on the lake as much as we would have liked. There's always next time.
Going under the highway was really cool, and we could see our campground from the highway when we drove by (we couldn't hear it from our site, though, which was fantastic). We also drove around the entire lake to check out other places to camp. We liked a few of the other places, but in the end, we decided our campground and our site were the best options on the lake. Score!
We got out to eat at good restaurants and check out the scenery in the area, which is a northwestern suburb of Dallas/Fort Worth. The Elm Fork Taphouse & Kitchen was our favorite, and we ate their twice before we left (and missed it after we left!). On one evening, we drove for a while to get to the Fort Worth Stockyards for the championship rodeo. We bought the best tickets we could, and we were front and center. Neither of us had ever been to a rodeo, and it was a cool experience. Sometimes, it was tough to watch calves getting roped, but we saw they were treated as humanely as possible, so we even enjoyed that. There were so many events, and we kept asking the experienced rodeo attendee next to us to explain everything (she was about 15 years old but knew a lot!).
They had an awesome event called a Kids Calf Scramble where a bunch of kids chased a calf around. It was adorable! The other events were also very cool, especially the barrel racing. The bull riding was also very impressive.
The rodeo ran until about 9:45PM, and we walked across the street to get some late dinner. We hadn't eaten since lunch. We ordered, and we were waiting for our food when we realized our campground closes its main gate at 10PM. There is no getting in after then! And we were over an hour away! And Lacey was in the motor home!
We finished dinner and formulated a plan. We knew we'd need to walk a mile or so in the dark woods to get to our site from the main gate, so we stopped by a Pilot gas station to buy clothes for the walk (it was going to rain, and it was cold). All they had was clothing for truckers, so we ended up with a glow-in-the-dark orange jacket. We parked at the gate, walked a mile in the drizzle, and got back to Lacey and the motor home. In the end, it was an adventure to walk in the dark and listen to little animals rustle in the bushes. In the morning, Margot took a Segway back to the gate to get the car. It was parked in a no-parking area but it was still there, without a ticket or fine. Too funny!
We also bought a Swivelwheel 58 Trailer to tow behind the motor home. It's not at all like a regular trailer. Instead of pivoting on the motor home hitch when you make a corner, it acts as an extension on the end of the motor home -- it doesn't turn. It has a single wheel underneath it at the back that swivels instead. It's tough to explain, but very cool. We've had to do a lot of modifications to it, but it's really working for us. And, it carries 1,000 pounds, much more than the hitch tray we'd been using.
We didn't have all of the parts and pieces we needed, and it was time to go! So, Margot towed the boat with the motor home and Monica towed the Swivelwheel with the car. We only went to another Dallas suburb, so it all worked out just fine. Here's the motor home and boat!
We will definitely stay at the Hickory Creek Campground again. We really recommend it!
