Saturday, May 8, 2010

Pioneer Day at Old Settlers Park

Don stepped outside this morning and came back in a few minutes…. “get your camera.”   In the park behind us was horse activity!  Meet Nugget.100_0885

Nuggets owners also own this pair of Belgian draft horses.100_0901

I’m curious as to what he’s telling her.100_0901-2

Aren’t they beautiful?  People attending Pioneer Day could ride in the wagon around the park.100_0905

We also saw the first Round Rock fire truck.2010 May 8 Old Settlers Park-5

And the first hand-drawn pumper truck in Round Rock.  The history is quite interested and can be read >here<. 2010 May 8 Old Settlers Park-6

In the picture above, the man standing on the right with the sun visor is Jeffrey Gibson, the 2009 Drag Boat Racing champion.  His “puller” is parked two sites from us.  We met his this morning and learned that his pastor is a chaplain with Racers for Christ on the drag boat racing circuit.  This is his “puller.”  It has a slide out on the other side.2010 May 8 Old Settlers Park-8

Back to Pioneer Days… there were many pioneer period characters re-enacting many phases of pioneer life in the history of Round Rock. 2010 May 8 Old Settlers Park-9

It was once green, but I didn’t find the words “John Deere” anywhere.100_0920

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Inside the barn above were many antique farm implements such as this old wagon, which Don explained to me is a manure spreader used to fertilize the gardens and crops.  Wouldn’t you have loved that job? 100_0923

Inside the barn were stalls with a raise walk to feed occupants of the stalls from. 100_0929

Inside the barn were stairs to the loft.100_0926

“Plowing is hard work.”100_0939

I wanted to fill a basket.2010 May 8 Old Settlers Park-10

We took a tour of the Palm Mansion and also took many pictures inside, but my favorite was a picture of a picture.  Click >here< for really good pictures.  Just click on the picture of the Palm Mansion to see the interior.  I wish I had taken notes from our tour guide because I can’t find a complete history of the Palm Mansion online.100_0960

Uh oh.  Potato.  One order please.  “Thank you, your fries will be ready in about 6 minutes.”  So I waited…100_0974

and waited…100_0976

and waited.  Six minutes is up!100_0977

Well worth the wait.  And still I have not met a potato I didn’t like.  In fact, this one may be my all time favorite.100_0978

Don was feeling kind of punky today, so we just hung out at the Q.  Definition of punky:  no energy; generally yucky.

Even so, we are blessed and God is good.

1 comment:

Joel and Linda said...

Love the old time machinery! I have to tell you that I have shoveled many of those spreaders full! We lived on a dairy farm and I raised hogs. You think Peewuuuee. Hogs are the worst! Loved it though.