Mineral Wells!

This is the drive into the town of Mineral Wells. It is about 1 1/2 hours from Arlington. The town is in a valley and before you get to it, going west on the freeway, overlooking the town is a state park. It has mountains! and a lake! and is pretty! I have to say, I was not impressed with the town. It was dirty, run down and had alot of what looked like crazy people. But with some effort, it looked like it could be a nice place to live. Alot of former glory.

Anyways, we went to Mineral Wells because we saw a special on the local news about how there was this spring with minerals in it that is bottled and sold to the public. It has lithium in one of the bottled waters. For people with different chemical ailments. Plus calcium!

If anyone remembers, Bruce hurt his ribs a couple of weeks ago and is still recovering. Bruce has a calcium deficiency and I believe it is why he gets injured so easily and takes so long to heal. So we went to buy this water to see if it could help me, with the lithium (I have never taken it before) and to see if it could help Bruce heal.

This is a picture of us next to the original arch ad at the only operating well left in a town that was born because of the mineral water. It's called the Famous Water Company.

There were alot of people there that weekend and they were super busy. So busy that they had to ration the amount of water you could buy. I bought an organic minty lemon soap and a cinn. apple lotion that they make with the water. Smells so good!

These are the huge storage cylinders that they keep the water in, that they pump out of the ground. The wells are tapped anywhere from 100 ft to 300 feet under the ground.They actually had a garden and play area for the kids, so they could play while we bought the water.

We went to eat at taco casa (yuk) before we went hiking at the State Park. It was five dollars per adult, kids under 12 are free. Nice, huh?

Did you know you can buy a state park pass for $60 for your whole family that you can use at any and all State Parks? We are thinking about buying a pass next year.

Here was one of our first views. It was at the back of the park.
This is actually a lake, it looks like a river to me!

This on our way down to the lake. This is on a rock staircase.

Rocks are all over the place and make for good climbing and there are some cool little crevasses, only little kids seem to fit in them, tho'

I thought about climbing this but changed my mind when I realized it was almost upside down and sideways, to try to climb. Lilli made the perfect addition to the shot.
This is a big rock in the lake that we managed to get on. I really like this picture.

This is under the rock-climbing cliffs. On top of the cliffs, they have clip-in ties for climbers.

Bruce managed to squeeze into the crevice. Don't ask me why.

By the way, Bruce is healing much better than before and has been drinking less than a cup of the mineral water a day.
It's a little hard to see, so click on it!