Enchanted Rock & Caching 5/6/2010

This morning we decided to drive down to Enchanted Rock State Park and on the way do some caching. Our first stop was at Greenwood Cemetery which wasn't really an old cemetery, but on the other hand our next stop was at St Mary's Pioneer Cemetery, which as the name would indicate was a very old cemetery. This was the original cemetery for St. Mary's Catholic Church with most of the graves dating back from the 1860's as you can see by the pictures. Also if you look at the pictures of the cemetery you will see several children who lived only a few months and another young woman who was murdered by the Indians.

Next was a multi-cache at a day spa, next was a puzzle cache located at a memorial stone at the Cross Mountain Nature Trail. Cross Mountain which overlooks the city from an elevation of 1,951 feet above sea level. The mountain is named for the giant cross which graces the landscape. A German settler named John Christian Durst erected the original cross of timber; a more modern version of concrete and steel now occupies the historic spot.

Then we drove to Crabapple, Texas and a cache along Crabapple creek. Then it was up the hill to Crabapple School. Crabapple, Texas is an unincorporated farming and ranching community 10.5 miles north of Fredericksburg in Gillespie County, Texas located on Crabapple Creek, about halfway between Fredericksburg and Enchanted Rock State Park at an elevation of 1,775 feet. The initial European settlers in Crabapple were German immigrants Friedrich Welgehausen, Jacob Land, Adam Pehl, Mathias Schmidt, Nicolaus Rusche, James Riley, Heinrich Kneese, and Jacob and Adam Fries in the mid 19th Century. Farmer Mathias Schmidt donated the land for a Crabapple school, earning the privilege by running a footrace with neighbor Crockett Riley who had also offered to donate land. Area families built the native limestone structure with their own labor. The 1878 school had a single classroom, with an adjoining room for the teacher living quarters. An outer staircase led to a second story storage space. An additional room was added later. The original schoolhouse also served as a post office from 1887-1910. The first postmaster was John J. Stein. There were a total of nine postmasters before the mail was routed to Willow City in 1910. A second limestone school was built in 1882 that also served as a Lutheran church, until the St. John's congregation erected its own building in 1887. Twenty-eight teachers taught at Crapapple School before it consolidated with Fredericksburg Independent School District in 1994. We found the cache and then walked around looking at the school and the Lutheran Church next door.

Then it was off to our last cache which was on a narrow country road on top of a hill with a view of Enchanted Rock. Then it was off to Enchanted Rock and the State Park. We didn't go in the park as it cost $6.00 each just to go in and we could see all we wanted to see from the road. If we had planned to climb to the top of the rock we would have gone into the park but we figured discretion was the better part of valor and we were maybe a little to old for a climb like that. Enchanted Rock is an enormous pink granite pluton located in the Llano Uplift approximately 15 miles north of Fredericksburg, Texas, and 15 miles south of Llano, Texas. Enchanted Rock State Natural Area, which includes Enchanted Rock and surrounding land, spans the border between Gillespie County and Llano County, south of the Llano River. Enchanted Rock covers approximately 640 acres and rises approximately 425 feet above the surrounding terrain to elevation of 1,825 feet above sea level. It is the largest such pink granite monadnock in the United States. Enchanted Rock State Natural Area, a part of the Texas state park system, includes 1,644 acres. The prominent granite dome is visible for many miles in the surrounding basin of the Llano Uplift. The weathered dome is a monadnock. The rock is actually part of a segmented ridge, the surface expression of a large igneous batholith of middle Precambrian (1,082 ± 6 million years ago) material that intruded into earlier metamorphic schists and gneiss. The intrusive granite of the pluton was exposed by extensive erosion of the surrounding sedimentary rock (which is primarily limestone).
Archaeological evidence indicates human visitation at the rock going back at least 11,000 years. Folklore of local Tonkawa, Apache and Comanche tribes ascribes magical and spiritual powers to the rock (hence the name 'Enchanted Rock'). While attempting to hide from Anglo settlers in the area, the Natives would hide on the top two tiers of the rock and, since they were unable to be seen from the ground below. The first European to visit the area was probably Álvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca in 1536. The Tonkawa, who inhabited the area in the 16th century, believed that ghost fires flickered at the top of the dome. In particular they heard unexplained creaking and groaning, which geologists attribute to the rock's night-time contraction after being heated by the sun during the day. The name "Enchanted Rock" derives from Spanish and Anglo-Texan interpretations of such legends and related folklore; the name "Crying Rock" has also been given to the formation. From its summit in 1841, Captain John C. Hays, while surrounded by Comanche Indians who cut him off from his ranging company repulsed the whole band and inflicted upon them such heavy losses that they fled.
Other legends associated with Enchanted Rock are:
* Named “Spirit Song Rock” for native legends
* Revered by native tribes as a holy portal to other worlds
* Anyone spending the night on the rock becomes invisible
* Spanish priest fled to the rock pursued by native tribes, disappeared, and returned to tell a mystic tale of falling into a cavern and being swallowed by the rock, encountering many spirits in the tunnels, eventually to be spit out two days later
* Haunted by spirits of warriors of a now-extinct native American tribe who were slaughtered at Enchanted Rock by a rival tribe
* Haunted by a native American princess who threw herself off the rock after witnessing the slaughter of her people
* Alleged sacrifices at the rock by both Comanche and Tonkawa tribes
* Believed to be a lost silver mine, or the lost El Dorado gold
* Bad fortune and death will befall anyone who climbs the rock with bad intent
* Footprint indentations on the rock of native American chief who sacrificed his daughter, condemned to walk Enchanted Rock forever
* Woman’s screams at night are of a white woman who took refuge on Enchanted Rock after escaping a kidnapping by native Americans
* Spanish soldier Don Jesús Navarro’s Enchanted Rock rescue of native maiden Rosa, daughter of Chief Tehuan, after her kidnap by Comanches intent on sacrificing her on the rock.
More than 500 species of plants. Four chief Plant Communities - Open Oak Woodland, Mesquite Grassland, Floodplain, and Granite Rock Community.
Vernal pools, ecologically threatened depressions of flora and fauna adapted to harsh environments, contain fragile invertebrate fairy shrimp.
Wildlife includes bats, ringtails, squirrels, and fox. A wide variety of lizards, including the Texas Horned Lizard can also be found.
Designated a key bird watching site, includes Wild Turkey, Greater Roadrunner, Golden-fronted Woodpecker, Western Scrub-Jay, Pyrrhuloxia, Canyon Towhee, Rufous-crowned Sparrow and Black-throated Sparrow, Lesser Goldfinch, Common Poorwill, Chuck-will’s-widow, Black-chinned Hummingbird, Vermilion Flycatcher, Scissor-tailed Flycatcher, Bell's Vireo and Yellow-throated Vireo, Blue Grosbeak, Painted Bunting, Orchard Oriole. Vesper Sparrow, Fox Sparrow, and Harris's Sparrow.
Park activities include caving, hiking, primitive backpack camping, rock climbing and picnicking. The Summit Trail is the most popular hiking path.
As you can see by a few of the pictures there are people on top of Enchanted Rock and the rocks next to it.....NOT US!!!!!!!!!!!! But it really was an awesome site to see.

Then we drove back to the coach for the afternoon. We did go out to dinner tonight at the Fredericksburg Brewery. Great food and even greater homemade "not so dumb blonde ale".....2 mugs worth. Well that's about all for today so until tomorrow we love and miss you all. Mom & Dad Dori & Dick