Greetings from Junction, TX!

Run Stats:
Day: 259
Miles Completed: 941.6
Miles to San Diego: 1158.4
Avg Miles/Day: 3.6
Marathons Completed: 36
Longest Run Streak: 9 days
Current Run Streak: 3 days
Shoes: Skora Fit/Skora Tempo
Playlist Favs: Beatles Shuffle

Bible Verse of the Day: Listen carefully to my words. Don't lose sight of them. Let them penetrate deep into your heart, for they bring life to those who find them, and healing to their whole body. Proverbs 4:20b-22 NLT

Run Reflections: When I finish my run later this morning I will be virtually arriving in the small town of Junction, TX. I've been heading mostly north for a few weeks but at this point, I-10 makes a turn to the west. Looking at a map, it's still a long way to the west Texas town of El Paso (reportedly the home of Rosa's cantina). It's currently 68 degrees and sunny in Junction but highs are expected to be around 95 :-( I'm glad our weather here is starting to trend more toward the 80's than the 90's. It's been a pretty good running week although I had/chose to skip a couple more days than planned. For the past year or so, I've been watching a VLOG on Run for God of a guy named Dean who shares his insights on running and God as he jogs down the road. Mia Grace has agreed to help me and, once I figure out the logistics, I hoping I can do something similar (at least once) here.

Junction: Here's some information from wikipedia on the town of Junction. Junction is the county seat of Kimble County, TX. It was founded in 1876 and is named for its location at the confluence of the North and South Llano Rivers. The town nicknames are: Land of Living Waters and Front Porch of the West. It's a pretty small town of 2.3 square miles. I have included a picture of downtown Junction take by Billy Hathorn (CC BY-SA 3.0). Wikipedia did not present any dramatic historical events for Junction but did find several interesting facts and aspects of this town:

Major celebrations in Junction included the Billie Sale and Parade held in August and the annual Kimble Kow Kick, which takes place in September. Sponsored by the Lonestar Barbecue Society, the Kow Kick is a cook off and family fun festival. Cool-off categories include brisket, pork spare ribs and beans. Family events include carnival rides, a children's pork chop competition and a washer pitching contest. - basically what we call corn hole but with flat hand-sized washers (like you use with a nut and a bolt). It looks like I just missed this event as it was held on September 3rd.

The town has 2 museums - the Kimble County Museum which contains documents, tools and other relics from the days of early settlers and the O.C. Fisher Museum (located in the County Library) which contains an exact duplicate of the Washington office of the long-time Congressman (Mr. Fischer I guess) who represented the Junction area.

Junction is home to several parks including the 507-acre South Llano State Park. According to their web site; the park consists of cool, clear water, shady trees and abundant wildlife such as the white-tail deer and Rio Grande turkey. There's lots of different camping options as well as a spring-fed (which always seems to mean freezing cold) scenic stream that has sufficient flow for tubing, canoeing and swimming. They also have 18 miles of hiking/biking trails. I've included 2 pictures from their website - one showing some kayakers and one showing some tubers (is that a word?).

Another interesting park with a cool name is the Kickapoo Cavern State Park which offers picnic sites, camping, hiking mountain biking, bird-watching, cave tours and evening bat flight viewing. The park has 20 known caves with some reported impressive rock formations. One of these is the Stuart Bat Cave which is a migratory stopover for large numbers of Mexican free-tailed bats from mid-March to the end of October. Prior to this, I thought the term kickapoo referred to what was likely to happen when I was cutting the grass in the backyard :-) - yes, I did need to include this.

For you SEC football fans, while coaching at Texas A&M, Paul "Bear" Bryant's 10 day summer football camp was held in Junction in 1954. The "Junction Boys" was the nickname given to those who made it through the entire camp. The event was described by Jim Dent in his book, The Junction Boys, which was published in 2000 and was portrayed in an ESPN TV film.

God Bless, Pat