Luckenbach/Bankersmith, TX

After leaving San Antonio we did quite a bit of a round-a-bout way through Texas, but enjoyable. When you only plan out a couple weeks in advance you’re not always the most efficient with your travel. 😊

From San Antonio we headed up to a very small town called Bankersmith. It’s near Luckenbach, which was the whole reason we went to that part of the state. Ever heard the song, Luckenbach Texas (Back to the Basics of Love) by Waylon Jennings? This is the town. So yes, we set our itinerary around going to this very place, but were surprised to find an even greater town than Luckenbach!

We stayed in a Harvest Host in Bankersmith, TX. We drove into this no stop light, no stop sign town and what we found was a huge farm and a saloon/dance hall that also served as the church on Sunday, the wedding venue, the graduation venue, the playground and the general hang out for the people in nearby ranches. It was quite a tight-knit community of people that welcomed us with open arms. [The picture above is an example of what is happening to the oak trees in the hill country of Texas. It's a disease coming up from Mexico and it's killing all of them. Hoping the disease doesn't make it to South Carolina!]

As part of Harvest Host (which allows you to stay on their land for free) you are to patronize their business. So we parked Elizabeth (our travel trailer) and headed up to the saloon to see what they were offering. We found a live band, small dogs, children playing outside in the pretend town build behind the saloon, a small store of wares and a lot of happy people. After hanging out for just a bit we decided we’d stay for dinner. We learned that the owner of this establishment was also the owner of the ranch, was 40 years old, an Air Force Academy grad and simply moved out there to provide the area with a more family-friendly establishment than what was offered by Luckenbach, which had become a place with too much money and fame and thereby attracted some “habits” that you don’t want to bring your children around in the evenings.

We did go into Luckenbach on Saturday for the lunch hour to watch a live band and experience what the song mentioned earlier was talking about. You can see that we clearly had a good time and enjoyed it.

But Bankersmith was the highlight. The ranch owners picked us up in their side-by-side (remember that term?) and took us to feed the camel, the goats and the bison. Caroline experienced her first “shock” when she touched the electric fence keeping the horses in. Needless-to-say, her response was more of surprise than pain. Don’t worry; she’s fine.

We attended “cowboy church” on Sunday back down at the saloon we ate at on Friday and Saturday night. The guest “preacher” was a country singer who actually left the professional country music business to travel around the country and share about how God had changed his life. It was a very personal morning with the people in the church sharing about their own heartache in life and how God had worked in the midst of it. A beautiful reminder of God’s faithfulness.