2/5/05: Bamberger Ranch Preserve, Texas

February 5, 2005
Bamberger Ranch Preserve, Texas - by Lynda DeGroot

After hearing that our work day was predicted to see a 70% chance of rain, what was supposed to be a large group of 15 ended up being myself and 3 other fairly new Trail Tamers who dared the weather to keep us at home! Even though the sky was black over Austin and there was a magnificent double rainbow with the most intense colors I’ve ever seen arching way up in the sky over Hwy 290 west, as I approached the intersection of Hwy 281 the sky was blue with a few puffy clouds over the Bamberger Ranch Preserve. It turns out the rain stayed away from where we were until about 4pm...just as we finished our last project and were starting to look at another!

The four of us began our day by cleaning up the trail to J. David Bamberger’s chiroptorium or man-made bat cave. After removing lots of overgrown weeds and trimming back low-hanging limbs, we moved on to the Turkey Hollow trail which the Trail Tamers had built in 2004. We were given the task of putting in stepping stones and steps to reroute a section of trail that crossed the creek. It seems that a HUGE rock slab that had been placed across the creek to serve as a bridge had been broken in two by a flash flood in earlier months. While Mr. Bamberger & his employee, Steven Fulton, plus Trail Tamers C.R.Thomas and Steve Williams struggled to move pieces of the slab and other huge rocks for use as stepping-stones, we ladies (Tita Owre and me) were busy finding & moving our own large rocks that we carefully positioned as steps.

When the work was declared done by Mr. Bamberger, we moved on to a third project, but a light rain finally began to fall. So, instead, we headed to Hes’ Country Store where we were treated to some fine tamales, beans, chips & salsa along with a lot of praise from Mr. Bamberger for a job well done!