November 28, 2021
Today we took that route that we intended to take when we made our unplanned drive on Chalk Cemetery Road. Well, sort of…
The journey began on Bo Brown Road (aka, Brown Road) off of FM 230 in Kittrell’s Cut-Off. The road starts off paved for a short distance, then turns to dirt. Soon after we started, however, there was a sign that warned that the bridge was out four miles ahead.
Bummer.
Well, we still had four miles to explore, so we continued on our way. Bo Brown Road mostly runs through forest, but there are a few pastures. We turned around at the gate to the JP Cattle Company, where the road becomes Houston County Road 3585.
The original plan was to follow CR 3585 into the nearby town of Weldon, so we doubled back to FM 230 and headed to Weldon that way, passing by the Wainright Unit state prison (formerly the Eastham Unit).
Weldon is a small agricultural community. It was founded shortly after the Civil War, and, in the late 1880s became a regional lumbering center when the Waco, Beaumont, Trinity and Sabine Railway (WBT&S) reached the town. (The WBT&S was, among other names, often called the Wobbly, Bobbly, Turnover & Stop due to frequent derailments.)
From Weldon we turned onto CR 3500. The road was very muddy due to recent rains. Some places would be challenging to smaller vehicles, I imagine, unless the road was dry.
Along the way was one of the largest herds of longhorn cattle we’ve ever seen. Below are pictures of a few.
CR 3500 ends at CR 3495. It ends on private property to the west, so we turned right (northeast).
CR 3495 is sort out in the middle of nowhere. We certainly didn’t expect to see much aside from “nature” in the area. But, we came up onto the entrance to someone’s ranch and saw these two really great sculptures on each side of the gate:
How cool is that? Nobody would see these unless they happened to be driving down this road, and there is really no reason for anyone except a small handful of people to be out there! I don’t know anything about them, like who made them or why.
CR 3495 ends at FM 230, and a short distance from that intersection is the junction with FM 2915. FM 2915 is paved and passes through some pretty pastureland and a little bit of forest before suddenly coming to an end at a dirt road. The name changes to CR 3475.
CR 3475 was a bit dicey in some spots–lots of mud. I’m sure it would be easy enough to drive when dry, but a couple of large areas were very slick and deep. I had automatic 4-wheel drive turned on, and the system definitely kicked in the front axle when we hit the muddy patches.
CR 3475 rises up in elevation a little bit, then ends at CR 3470. We turned left (west) onto CR 3470 and followed it back downhill to CR 3480. CR 3480 passes over Big Creek (which is a big creek!) and ends at paved road FM 3275, which took us to State Highway 21.
We decided to turn left and head to Madisonville for some dinner and shopping, but along the way we made a stop at Rattlesnake Ranch Pecans (puh-kaan for you “pee-can” folks) for some snacks and pecans for a Christmas pecan pie. They have a nice variety of candied pecans sold in bags and tins, as well as jams, preserves, butters, syrups, and gifts.
It was a fun and relaxing trip today. The weather started out cloudy and a little chilly, but soon after we got to Bo Brown Road the sky began to clear up. The fall colors are in full swing here, too.
We rounded out the day with dinner at Joe’s Italian Grill in Madisonville. This is a great little restaurant, and it’s not too far off of I-45 if you happen to be passing through the area. Our favorite dishes are the stromboli and the ribeye-steak cremora mushrooms. Their pizza is good, too. The staff are very friendly.
The trip home was interesting, to say the least. We took TX-75 toward Huntsville, but the road was unusually busy due to the holiday traffic (people returning home after Thanksgiving). I-45 was packed, and the smart ones found the side route on 75. We, being locals, were even smarter and turned off of 75 onto some back roads to get home faster.
All-in-all, though, a very good day.