My First Tamale

What a lazy day this has been.  After breakfast and a shower we went for our walk around the campground.  In this campground there are arrows painted on the streets directing walkers in and out of the maze of streets which eventually results in a 2.1 mile walk.  Even though we got an early start at about 8:30, the temperature was already 75 degrees.  I should have saved my shower until after the walk.  Gene used the remainder of the morning to wax the truck (that guy thing again) and I tried to catch up on the adventures of friends through their blogs and emails.

I guess we were both tired from our long day yesterday.  We really just didn’t want to wander too far today.  We finally decided to seek the solace of a good bookstore.  One of our favorite things to do is go to a bookstore that has a coffee bar, order coffee and spend a little quiet time with favorite books.  I always seem to select a few cookbooks and am content to flip through the pages looking at the pictures.  Gene’s favorite is the big magazine racks.  He also likes the travel section, both magazines and guidebooks.  To our dismay, there were no Borders, Barnes and Nobles, or Books a Million in Harlingen.  There was a Walden Books, but there has never been a Walden that I have been in with a coffee bar.  So we did the next best thing, I think.  We took our own books (yes, I took a cookbook) to Starbucks.

Between the two of us we read several blogs of fellow RVers.  From those blogs, we get first hand information about road conditions, campgrounds, and great places to eat, shop, and visit.  Several of those bloggers are spending the winter here in the Rio Grande Valley and we have taken advantage of their recommendations of several things.  One of the places we had been on the lookout for since arriving in Harlingen was Alejandro’s, a Mexican bakery.  From Gordon and Juanita’s blog, Seeing the USA in our Chevrolet, we learned this was a great place for sugar cookies and tamales.  We are real fans of Mexican food and try to get a fix at least once a month no matter where we are.  We have been so focused on Texas BBQ that both our stomachs are craving Mexican.  On our way back from Starbucks, we stopped in Alejandro’s for tamales.  Yummy.   When ordering Mexican food I always go for something with a flour tortilla and lots of cheese.  That is because the one and only time I had a corn tortilla (taco shells don’t count), I was not impressed.  Alejandro’s has shown me the light.  We bought a dozen pork.  We ate one each for a snack when we got home; I put 6 in the freezer for another day and 4 in the refrigerator for dinner tomorrow.

It turned out to be a hot day (hot by my standards) in the valley—about 88 degrees this afternoon, with a brisk wind.  We turned on the air conditioner and are enjoying the cool comfort inside.