Trip to Texas

Feb 12 - 17, Dave and I took a quick, but lovely trip to Texas to visit cousin Rhoda. We had a whopping big Texas time!

Our first adventure was taking the train from Normal to Dallas...a 19 hour trip with a couple hour delay thrown in for good measure. Our leg room was exceptional, with seats that went back and foot rests that came up. It was a good idea, but for some reason you could not get comfortable in these "recliners." I was amazed at how quiet the train ride was...so quiet during the night that I was afraid to even chew on the pretzels I had packed for fear I might wake somebody up!

I had been to the JFK museum before, but I wanted Dave to see it, so we spent a morning in downtown Dallas. The weather was beautiful that day, in the upper 70's.

Here Dave is having a Texan chat with some real cowboys down at the Ft. Worth Stockade. He had heard us talking about the stockade for a couple of days. When we got there and entered the first little shop, the first shop of about 3 blocks of shops, he looked at me like, "Oh no, this is SHOPPING!" 

But it wasn't long until he got intrigued with the architectural details and the anbiance of the place. Again, the weather was perfect, and we had a great time. These cowboys made sure to invite us to the "shoot-out" they were staging after the longhorn cattle drive. We hustled into position to watch Dave's new "friends" put on their show. It was the one joke of the entire trip. If you are ever at the stockade, don't bother with the Legends of Texas street show shoot out. It was a real snoozer.

The last day we took a tour of the AT&T Stadium. I'm not into football, but even I appreciated the beauty of that classy building, done up in real style. They were getting ready for a Motorcross dirt event, so we couldn't go onto the field, but the tour was interesting and well worth the time and money.

The train ride home was another long night in the chairs, with long delays due to the ice storms in the Midwest. But we used the extra time to rest up from the good time we were treated to by Rhoda and friend, Renae. Besides the events pictured above, we had some fabulous eating out and eating in, some good soaking in their hot spa tub, a visit to their church, and a tour of Rhoda's workplace.

If you ever get a chance...a trip to Dallas is a good idea!