The first time we traveled from Houston to LA, the billboards about the Thing piqued our curiosity. It's also a convenient place to make a pit stop. The long, lonely stretches of I-10 from Kerville to LA have only a handful of cities. Most of the time, you're looking out the window at desert or irrigated farmland.

The exhibits are in three metal buildings behind the Trading Post. You go out through a door into the blistering heat of the uncovered walkway (probably not much need for rain shelters). The shade in the building is a welcome respite.

If you like old vehicles, some interesting ones are here, and if you're not all that interested, the cheesy informational placards are amusing.

Its warm inside and stuffy, but not oppressively so.

We thought this might have been left by a fugitive from the Dust Bowl who didn't make it to California.

Opposite the farm equipment are all sorts of animal horns, including these from a Texas Longhorn. These are just average for that cattle breed.

How did this get left behind?

The furniture sort of goes with the art.

Sherry lived in a lot of unusual places because her father was in the US Army. When she was in elementary school, they lived in the Kentucky country between Vine Grove and Elizabeth Town in a house rented from tobacco farmers. The telephone looked just like this. Everyone was on the same line, but each phone had it's own ring so you'd know the call was for you. Of course, anyone could and probably did listen in and service during storms was extremely unreliable. Amazing how much technology has changed in such a short time.

Weapons are another curiosity in the collection.