We got up early to leave Shakespeare Ghost Town in New Mexico because we were booked to stay at a Harvest Host spot in San Elizario, Texas called Licon Dairy.

That meant that we were going to be driving all the way across New Mexico in just one day!

We made it to the dairy and mommy and daddy went in to eat and then took a tour to see all of the farm animals that were at the dairy.  There were all kinds of animals at the petting zoo there.  There were cows, and horses, and ostriches, and camels, and chickens, and turkeys and all kinds of other stinky animals.  When mommy and daddy got back to the house on wheels, they stank like of those other nasty animals.  I didn’t understand why they had to see all of those things when they had the best dog in the world right inside their house waiting for them.  Sometimes mommy and daddy say that I brag about being the best dog in the world too much and that I should be humbler, but it’s not really bragging when it’s true.

The next morning, we got up early again and started off to Fort Stockton.  Daddy had told me that there would be grass in Texas, but I thought that he must have been mistaken because so far, Texas seemed a lot like Arizona and New Mexico to me.  I hadn’t seen a blade of grass yet, so I had to still just pee and poop wherever I could find.

When we got to Fort Stockton, we stayed at a place called Hilltop RV Park.  There were little strips of grass there along the edges, but for the most part, it was a big open spot of white dirt, but I still liked it there.  A little bit of grass was better than nothing.  We got there on Monday, November 8th and stayed for two nights.  On Wednesday morning we got up before the sunrise again and started our way to San Antonio.  Luckily, I’ve convinced mommy and daddy that even on those early days, it’s best if I eat my breakfast before we leave.  That way I don’t get hangry later.  They seem to think that it’s a good idea too because we’ve done it that way ever since that time in Montana.  I’m glad that mommy and daddy took my advice.  I try to train them well.

It was going to be over a five-hour drive from Fort Stockton to San Antonio, which is a lot longer than what we drive on most days.

After a couple of hours, we stopped at a rest area so that we could all go potty.  When I got out, I was like, “Grass!  Finally grass!  Thank you, Jesus, for giving me grass!”

I was so excited!  I started sniffing around and looking for the perfect spot to pee and poop.  After a short time, I found a good spot and did my business.  Right after that I took one step and felt a piercing pain in my paw.  I didn’t know what it was, but man did it hurt!  I could barely walk and had to limp over to daddy.  He said, “What’s wrong buddy, did you step on a sand spur?”

I was like, “I don’t know what I stepped on man, but it hurts.”

Daddy picked my paw up and pulled that thing out for me and my paw felt better right away.

Daddy said, “There you go pal, it was a sand spur, you should be ok now.”

He was right, but I thought to myself, “Well daddy, if you knew that these things were here, you could have told me first!”

Once we got back into the house on wheels, daddy told mommy that he was really tired and she’d have to drive just from this rest area to the next rest area if we were going to make it to San Antonio by 1 PM.  At first, mommy thought that he was joking, but he wasn’t.  Mommy only ever drives the house on wheels if we have to get closer to hook-ups and one time in Wisconsin, she drove us to the dump station.

I was like, “Are you sure this is a good idea daddy?”  But he insisted and mommy got into the driver’s seat.  Mommy wanted daddy to sit in the passenger seat, but daddy said, “That defeats the purpose of me taking a nap.”  I was really confused by the whole thing.

Daddy sat up front to start, but as soon as mommy got on the highway, he went back and took a nap on the couch.

At that point, I took over as the co-pilot.  I jumped on the passenger seat and told mommy that she was doing great.  I stayed up there and watched the scenery and mommy for quite some time and once I knew that mommy had everything under control, I hopped off and laid down kind of between mommy and daddy so that I could keep an eye on both of them.  That’s my biggest job in life you know, to keep an eye on my mommy and daddy and make sure that they’re ok.  If I see that they’re anxious or stressed about something, I just make sure that they pet me.  When they pet me, all of their stress and anxiety just disappears.

After a little more than an hour, we got to the next rest area and mommy pulled the house on wheels into a spot.  Daddy woke up, we all went potty and then daddy started driving again.

Just as we wanted to, we pulled into the KOA in San Antonio just a few minutes after 1 PM.  I could tell right away that I was going to like this place!  Our spot was right next to a big patch of grass and that patch of grass didn’t have any of those little paw piercing spikey balls in it!

We were going to be in San Antonio until Sunday, which was five days.  Like I said, I really liked this campground, so that really made me happy.

Mommy and daddy really liked San Antonio as well.  They would take a bus into the city each day and check out all of the really cool things that were in the city.  One day they went in on the bus in the morning, came back to see me and feed me in the afternoon, and then they went back into the city again that night.

When they would come back each night, they would talk about how much they enjoyed their time in the city.  I really wished that I could have gone into the city with them, but mommy and daddy said that only service dogs were allowed to ride on the bus.  Man, I need to figure out how to get one of those vests!

Even though mommy and daddy went into the city every day that we were in San Antonio, they made sure to spend some quality time with me too.  We walked along the cool trail that bordered the campground each day.  We would walk at least a mile or two.  I love taking walks with mommy and daddy.  We even went over and played in Kamp K-9 at the campground.  Kamp K-9 is what the KOA campgrounds call their dog parks.  Every other campground that we’ve been in that has a dog park just calls them, “dog park,” but KOA calls them Kamp K-9.  It must be some sort of marketing thing, I guess.  I think that every KOA that we’ve stayed at has a Kamp K-9, but this one was definitely one of the biggest.

I was sad to leave San Antonio because I really liked it there, but we had to get to Houston to have some things done to the house on wheels.  Daddy and the house on wheels had a little run in with a large tree branch back in Phoenix and the back ladder on the house on wheels got mangled up a little bit.  So, because of that we had to get to the Lazy Days service center just outside of Houston.  We also had to get the oil changed on the generator in the house on wheels.

When we left the campground in San Antonio, we went to see all of the San Antonio Missions.  I was able to walk around the grounds, but not allowed to go into the buildings.  Mommy would go into each building and me and daddy would walk around the grounds.  Mommy took a lot of pictures when she went into each one, that way daddy could see what he missed by staying with me.

After we checked out all of the missions, we got gas, daddy was happy because gas was less than $3.00/gallon in Texas.  Daddy gets so excited about less expensive gas.  He tells me that I can’t say cheap gas because even $2.68/gallon isn’t cheap, it’s just less expensive than what we’ve been paying for the last three months.

We pulled into Lazy Days about 7 PM.  Mommy and daddy ate dinner and called Uncle Donnie and Aunt Kathy before we went to bed for the night.  I thought that it was neat that we were able to sleep at Lazy Days for the night before we were about to get service done.  Lazy Days allows people who live in their houses on wheels to sleep there when service is getting done.

The next day, I was allowed to go in the waiting room with mommy and daddy and of course everyone that worked there and even some people that didn’t, wanted to come up and pet me.  They all smiled so much when they petted me and they would tell mommy and daddy how cool of a dog I was.  Remember what I said earlier?  It’s not bragging if it’s true.

Everything got done with the house on wheels except for the ladder because it had to be ordered.  It’s going to take 6-8 weeks to come in because everything in the world is being held up because of supply chain delays.  I don’t know what that means, but that’s what daddy told me.  We’ll either have to go back to Houston or they’ll ship the ladder to Florida to fix it when it comes in.

Now we were off to Houston for a couple of weeks.