Hill Country of Texas

Bluebonnets on a ranch near Kerrville, Texas

In the hill country of Texas bluebonnets, white poppies, daisies, and several other flower species all bloom around the end of March and into April. This year, 2016, has been an especially great spring for the flowers as the winter was mild with plenty of rain.

My mother's sister lives near Bandera, the Cowboy Capital of the World. It's hard to believe as the only "cowboy" I've seen so far was a dude in shorts, a cowboy hat and painted cowboy boots, probably bought that very day at the Western Warehouse in San Antonio.

We flew into San Antonio on Tuesday and spent a sunny Wednesday traveling all through the hill country stopping often to photograph the rolling limestone hills, red granite cliffs, clear streams, and wildflowers. Because it was a weekday there were no traffic jams at the more scenic spots, though there were certainly a lot of people out doing the same thing.

The Hill Country is an area bounded by San Antonio in the south, Austin in the East, and the Llano red granite uplift in the north and west. West of Kerrville the hills seem like small mountains, the roads narrow and twisty, the views from hilltops spectacular.

Larger towns have common national brand-name hotels, but the smaller towns feature B&B's, cabins, cottages, and furnished apartments available from local internet sites and others like AirBnB and HomeStay. The streams and rivers are fairly shallow but wide, and navigable by flat bottomed canoes that are available to rent. Cypress trees line many of the creeks with spaghetti-piles of convoluted roots.

This year it is green, so green as to seem like a miracle to most of us westerners who've grown accustomed to the decade long drought.

The local food is phenomenal: BBQ (Coopers in Llano) and chicken fried steak (Hill Country Cafe in Kerrville). Mashed potatoes with cream gravy, fried okra, crispy green beans, fresh salads, coleslaw, potato salad, black and pinto beans, cobblers with local blackberries and cherries, even homemade apple ice cream in Medina.

So far it's been a fantastic trip; visiting relatives, seeing friends in Austin, and adding one more checkmark on my bucket - photographing the bluebonnets at high season in Texas.

Ranch decor with bluebonnets.

Cypress roots holding trees to the riverbanks.

Remnant of a long ago Cypress along the Median River