Panhandle Plains Historical Museum

After leaving Copper Breaks we traveled about another hour and stopped in Wichita Falls at one of the Texas Travel Centers. We were thinking of spending one day in Amarillo so we picked up lots of pamphlets and got one of the new 2008 Texas Travel Guides. I just love thumbing through those looking at all the neat things to do and see in each city in Texas.

We passed through Amarillo and ate lunch and thought we might see some of the sights there but later decided to go on to Palo Duro because the kids were getting cranky and we had to set up camp. Amarillo has several free things to see there like the zoo, art museum, the famous Cadillacs half buried in the dirt and then there were a couple of other museums. I had all these plans to go back one day and at least do the free things but once we got to the canyon it just did not happen. Maybe we will go back one day.

We then drove about 30 miles south of Amarillo to get to Palo Duro Canyon State Park which is near the town of Canyon. Canyon is a cute little college town home to the West Texas A & M University. But the most remarkable thing about Canyon is the Panhandle Plains Historical Museum which is located on the college campus. It is the biggest museum of its kind in Texas. Oh my goodness...I mean big. We went through it one day and we must have spent 4 hours and I still don't feel like I saw everything like I wanted. It was hard chasing Joshey around and he was getting very cranky there toward the end. I could have spent an entire day there really studying everything. James and Callie were awestruck!

Their collection of prehistoric fossils and dinosaur bones was just incredible. Did you know we had giant prehistoric sloths and camels living in Texas?! They had rooms of beautiful art, a huge gun collection, a wonderful native American collection as well as tons of local history. It just went on and on I think we may have even missed one of the floors. The basement was a recreation of an entire old west town with the buildings all decorated with period furniture and artifacts. They even had a couple of real authentic cabins moved into the building with all the contents. I think one is the oldest standing cabin in Texas. Simply wonderful..I can't say enough.

Here are some of the pictures we took there:

Copper Breaks State Park

A couple of weeks ago we took a week long trip out to west Texas! We had the best time. Our primary destination was Palo Dura Canyon State Park which is right under Amarillo. It is an 8 hour drive there so we broke the trip up to make it easier on the kids. We drove 2 hours to Dallas and spent the night with Oma and Granddad and then got up and drove 3 hours to Copper Breaks State Park. We spent one night there before leaving and driving 3 more hours to go to Palo Dura. Copper Breaks is a nice state park. It was very dry there and we were under a burning ban during most of our trip. You can see in one of the slides below how the doc has no water under it!

They had a really neat little free museum with nature samples and history of the area. I was very intrigued by the story of Cynthia Ann Parker. Comanches captured her at the age of 9, and she was raised by them. It seems like the Indians killed her family and also took her brother. I think I remember reading that her brother came down with small pox, or some sickness, as a young man and the Indians abandoned him...but one of the women stayed with him and nursed him back to health and they settled down and had a family. Don't quote me on that, but I think that is how it went.

Cynthia Ann married one of the Comanches and had three children. In 1860 some soldiers came and captured her and her baby daughter. Her baby soon died of influenza and she missed being with the Comanche people. She stopped eating and died in 1870. This is so sad to me. Her husband and one son died as well not long after she was captured. But one of her sons, Quanah Parker, later became chief of the Comanches!! I just looked her up on Wikipedia and found out more interesting info. Here is the link if anyone is interested: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cynthia_Ann_Parker I just love Wikipedia!

Cynthia Ann nursing her baby daughter, Prarie Flower, and dressed as Comanche

Her son, Quanah Parker

Here is a slide show of some pretty scenery and the kids playing on the little playground by our camp site. One rule of camping with little ones is...camp as close as possible to the bathrooms and the playground. We saw a lot of bats flying around that evening and we heard one in the little cone shaped thing over our picnic table. It left us some lovely guano on our picnic table...no we did not eat off of it.

I will soon post about the rest of our trip!!