The last winery we visited had a herd of cows roaming around. At the risk of perpetuating more Texas stereotypes, I took pictures of the cows - longhorns, to be exact - wandering through the vineyards. We learned from the winery staff that female longhorns have longer, sharper horns and the bulls have shorter, stubbier horns. Nevertheless, the male longhorn bulls are very aggressive - one had impaled a horse the month before.  

The stories of muderous cows didn’t faze me, as I was determined to pet one before we left. I love cows. They’re cute and they look soft and warm. They have an air of stubborn determination, yet are calm, laid-back creatures. You could never force a cow to do something it didn’t want, but it’ll invite you to hang out and chew some cud for a while. Coincidentally, I was born in the year of the Ox - which could explain my admiration of bovine creatures.

Several of the longhorns stopped for a drink of muddy water. I took this as an opportunity to say Hi, and started to approach. From behind on the winery patio, one of the staff yelled out, “You pay for the wine tasting, but a bull goring is on the house!” Ha ha. Tbus and MuffinBoy, standing several feet behind me, added, “Don’t worry. She’s a runner.” Undaunted, I kept approaching the cows, making kissy noises under my breath (works with dogs and cats, why not cows?) As I got closer, one of the cows (middle picture) stopped drinking and lifted her head to give me a “Don’t fuck with me, yo” stare. I backed away, and she eventually left.

I tried approaching the other cows, but they would ignore me until I almost reached them….then they’d run off. Finally, as we were leaving, I saw a calf standing next to the winery patio, munching on some grass. It hadn’t seen me, so I tiptoed behind it and pet it’s back. The calf got freaked, and scampered off…..but all I could smell was victory.

These pictures were taken during our hike up Enchanted Rock. In the first picture, the tiny speck is MuffinBoy…..who bounded up the rock with such enthusiasm that Tbus called him a mountain goat. Five seconds after that picture was taken, MuffinBoy disappeared over the top of the rock, leaving Tbus and I huffing and puffing our way up the hill. We kept stopping every now and then to catch our breaths, pretending that we were actually stopping to admire the vegetation. “Ooh! Look at this hole.” “Hey, look - another plant.” “I need to stop for a minute…so that I can stand and admire the view.”  

When we did reach the top, we found MuffinBoy in deep thought (middle picture). Tbus joined him, and I sat a bit further down the rock….lay back, felt the wind and stared up at the sky. The entire time we sat there, I was more relaxed than I’d been in….years. It was pretty fucking amazing.

Afterwards, we explored a few caves. At one point, I climbed out of a cave and found myself staring out over a steep edge of Enchanted Rock. I suddenly felt like I was standing on the edge of a cliff, and serious vertigo kicked in. This onset of vertigo made my descent very slow, especially since the slope of Enchanted Rock creates an optical illusion….in places, it looks like a sudden drop, when it’s really just a gradual slope. As you can see in the 3rd picture, I was much, much slower climbing back down than Tbus and MuffinBoy. I eventually caught up and we made it safely back to the car.

And lastly, this field of bluebonnets was at the base of Enchanted Rock. Beautiful.