Adventures of a Latter Day Coosie #2

Continued from last blog..............

My John Deere Triumph wagon is almost finished.  The one thing I have not finished is the wagon tongue. The old one was rotten when I got the wagon from Wayne Snider a year and a half ago.  I have the new wagon tongue almost completed, with the exception of a few small details.  My plan is to set up the camp, displaying the tongue as if it finally became necessary to build a new tongue while on the trail.

 With this in mind, I will get to use my old tools and display them in a functional setting.  I will have all the old parts lying around with wood shavings etc., which will hopefully look like that work has actually been done at the campsite.  That is the plan anyway.  Hope it works out that way.  I have never asked a wagon judge if this type of actual "work" adds to the judging of the wagon or at least maybe some points toward --the camp. Either way, it can't hurt, my opinion on the subject is that anything that will make your camp and wagon look the least bit different from other wagons, you are a bit ahead even if it is just in the subconscious mind of the judges.

Well, back to the preparation for attending the Festival of the West.  We have already committed to attend the Star of Texas Chuck Wagon cook-off in Austin, Texas the week prior to the Arizona competition. Luckily we were able to get Jerry Baird, from Snyder, Texas to take his Longtrack wagon to Austin so we can just go down there and help him cook.  That make it much easier.

 The time between the two events is only going to be about three days, so I will have to get the wagon and trailer loaded before going to Austin. I have many of the things loaded already and daily I have to go and pull things off the trailer that we will need in Austin.  No problem  Like Nike says, Just Do It.

We will travel pretty light to Austin, compared to what we would usually take if we were cooking on our own wagon.  We only have to take our teepee, sleeping bags, cot, wind screens, ground cooking stove, clothes and some wood.  Actually this time we would have taken the wagon from El Paso, except we are going to pick up my motorcycle from my son, Clayton, who lives in Austin.  He has had my Yamaha VMax since his GSXR was stolen last September.  We are pulling a trailer down to Austin with the hopes that his new cycle will come in while we are there.

We will leave El Paso and drive to Jerry's ranch outside Mason, Texas where we will spend the night. Today is March 9, 2006.

We are now at the ranch and Jerry is cooking pork loin steaks and baked potatoes.  Ummm good!  The last time we were here it was a sack of hamburgers.  Guess we're moving up in the world. It was also raining the last time and we got stuck in front of his house.  That time we were ambling around looking for arrowheads and came across a couple of old hinges lying on the ground by the water tank.

 I  took them home and now they are holding the door on my wood cook stove that I carry to some competitions.

Time to leave the ranch and make our way into Austin with a stop for breakfast in London, Texas.  It sure is nice to have someone else doing the cooking. This place is a typical small town cafe' ...not even one street light.  In the cafe' sits the local cowboys and old timers having breakfast.  One table for about 6 or 7 of them and we at another table.  There are only about two other tables in the whole place.  We are in the place at 6 am and two small children are dropped off by a parent and they get to eat a quick bite of breakfast before the school bus picks them up at about 6:30. I think the grandparents run the cafe.... Felt sorry for them having to be up so early and figured they must go through the same sort of routine at the end of the day. Sure makes for a long day for kids not older than about 8 or 9.

Since this is not about the Austin cook-off  I won't bother you with too many of the details other than to say we are back from Austin and didn't exactly need an armed escort to protect our winnings.  We won second in meat, which was chicken fried steak.  We used Jerry's All Purpose World Championship seasoning as a marinate for the meat and also utilized it in the flour for the batter.

 It was nice.  Oh, and also we got BIG rains during the competition and nearly all of the wagons had to be pulled out of the low ground area with 4 wheel drive vehicles.  Our food categories: bread, potatoes, and beans were sort of middle of the pack overall and were out of the money.  The dessert, however, was really terrible looking.  I didn't roll the dough out thin enough, so when we put it on the top of the peach cobbler....it sank.  That just didn't make a very pretty site.  The cobbler actually had an excellent taste, but as someone once said,  "she don't look so good".  Oh well!!! Sometimes you win sometimes you lose and sometimes you don't even get a smell.

Speaking of not getting a smell,  Last October in Ruidoso, New Mexico at the Lincoln County Cowboy Symposium we cooked the best overall meal we had ever done and we sincerely thought we had a shot at winning the whole shebang.  That was the one we didn't even get a smell.  Not even a fourth place in anything.  Skip, Eddie, Steve, Sully, and I did most of the cooking so I guess we know who gets all the creditos.  We did have fun though.  Actually we always have fun.

For the Ruidoso event, Sully flew his plane  in from Ft. Thomas, Arizona and we picked him up at Alamogordo, New Mexico and he spent the weekend helping us cook. Steve Woods came from /Denton, Texas and brought Eddie Sandoval from Ft. Worth.  Monty Montismith, also from Ft, Worth, was a constant story teller and kept us in stitches most of the time.  Manuel Lopez, Ft. Worth resident, provided lots of good help as well as a melodious stream of guitar music and singing.  He was accompanied my Chuck on his guitar.

Now, I have to tell you, Chuck was easy to feed because he ate out of the garbage can most of the time...let me explain.  The Food Network was there doing filming for the food channel and spent a good amount of time in our camp.

 When they exited our camp at the end of the day they caught Chuck sampling some of the food we had just thrown in the trash can.  Chuck is a real piece of work and if we weren't laughing at his funny songs, we were laughing at something he did.  We even awarded him the "Spur of the Moment: award from out camp for television notoriety.  The origin of the award is another story for another time.

Now comes the time for us to get serious about the Arizona cook-off  because we are going to be cooking against some folds we have never met.  California, Arizona, Nevada, New, Mexico, and Texas will be represented.  Silky told me that the Hanging Tree Ranch wagon from Bandera, Texas was also going to be in attendance.

 I sure hope that between us we can make a descent showing and uphold the Texas reputation.

Steve Woods is coming form Denton and we will go from El Paso to Scottsdale in his pickup because the traveling will be more comfortable since he has a four door pick up..

 Pulling my trailer and wagon will be not big deal for his one ton rig.  Skip and I even considered taking two trucks to Arizona because we are going to have so much stuff.  One thing that will make a difference is that we don't have to take any Mesquite wood.

Steve told us in Austin that his Dad wasn't doing very well and was not responding to the dialysis treatment. He and his Dad are very close and according to Steve, his Dad is refusing to do any additional treatment or take any medications.  Basically the doctors haven't given him much hope of lasting more that a couple of weeks.  Steve said he was still planning on joining us in Arizona to serve as a distraction.

To be continued...................