I almost didn't do a post this week. You see, I decided to see how the "other half" live and checked into a true to life RV resort.
Well, that kinda made me decide to go on a vacation, actually I guess you'd call it a "staycation", since I brought my house with me.
Mill Creek Ranch resort, where I stayed, is very nice, and I really wanted to just kick back for a couple of weeks. But that was not to be.
I couldn't just hang around. I get all jittery if I don't move a little bit, so I decided to check out what was going on around Canton, Texas. And boy did I find out!
Before you ask: no, I didn't go there for First Monday Trade Days, the famous (and huge) flea market. I did a whole lot of that many moons ago, and the last thing I wanted to do was fill up the rig with ju, er, collectibles. I just spent a year getting rid of all that!
What I did though was used an old standby. I Googled "Attractions near Canton", and got a couple of interesting hits. So, I loaded up the camera and my little cooler of goodies and headed out.
First stop: the Salt Palace in Grand Saline, about 15 minutes away. I'm ashamed to say that I grew up barely an hour away, and of course new the name, but I never new that Grand Saline was actually home to a staple in just about every kitchen in the country - Morton's Salt.
Yep, the blue box with the little girl on the label and the saying "When it rains, it pours" comes from this sleepy little town in east Texas. And they still mine and package all the salt sold under that name, as well as a whole lot of other salt products for medical, agricultural and other uses.
And here's the cool part. Grand Saline sits on a salt dome that is 20,000 feet deep. Where they are mining now, at about 750 feet the dome is about 1.5 miles wide and it gets bigger as it goes deeper. The existing mine could go to 4000 feet. If all the salt used in the U.S. came from just this one mine, it would last for 20,000 years!
The Salt Palace doesn't really compare in stature to the building of the same name in Utah, but that's also not it's purpose. Built to act as a visitors center, it's a neat little building that house memorabilia and items related to history of the salt business in Grand Saline.
And did I mention that it's built entirely of salt? A tradition here is to lick the building. Yep, you read that right. Bacteria can't grow on salt, so it won't make you sick or anything, so licking the bricks is actually encouraged. Did I do it? I've often heard the saying "video or it didn't happen" so,
Side note: If you're running low on salt, stop by the Salt Palace. Every visitor leaves with one of those blue boxes.
The town of Grand Saline, quite naturally, is quite proud of it's main product. There are Morton's signs and other salt related stuff all over the place. The logo for the town is a shaker pouring out a mound of salt and there's even a restaurant across from the Palace called Salt Licker's!
The downtown area is suffering like a lot of small towns. Closed up storefronts seem to be in the majority. But the town has a plan. Grand Saline Main Street is an organization dedicated to revitalizing the place. The have put together the money to open a new and much larger salt museum, and several landowners have committed to upgrading their buildings. Plans are in the works for apartments, shops and cafes in some of the beautiful old structures. I sure hope it works.
And just around the corner from the new museum is probably the most small town thing I've ever seen. The City Pharmacy museum's name is only slightly misleading. It is a museum of sort, and it's in an old pharmacy, but what it's primary purpose is a gathering place for the old timers: a place to have a cup of coffee, shoot the breeze and maybe play a game of three of dominoes. Every morning the regulars gather at one of the tables (built by one of them) in the old pharmacy to hammer out the issues of the day - politics, gossip and of course football. And the museum part? Scattered around the place are pieces donated by the locals, and along one wall is a shelf holding the hats of regulars who have passed on and tributes to them provided by their families.
I also visited the East Texas Zoo and Gator Farm. Not the greatest attraction, but this little side of the road zoo has quite the collection of critters, from tortoises to zebra and monkeys to of course gators. It was kinda fun to walk around and check the place out.
I'm not sure what I'll do next week. I'm not moving (two weeks in the same place: a new record!) Next weekend is my 45th high school reunion, so I might just make that the story, who knows?
Oh, and no YouTube this week. I didn't really like how any of the video came out. I'm leaning more and more toward getting some new equipment. At least get a camera I can put a noise cancelling mike on.
So, until next week,
Later, folks.
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