Final Week in America

Our final destination before our flight out was Columbia, Missouri.  We arrived to find a happy dog waiting to play with us.  Jasper had been a puppy the last time Lindsay saw him, so his size was her first surprise.  The second was his amazing ability to chase (sometimes catch), gather, and stack frisbees in his mouth.  Throughout our time there, Jasper and I had many frisbee sessions.  Jasper also showed us that Lindsay's parents had gifts for us in the bedroom: t-shirts of our favorite restaurant, HuHot.  Later that night, after the parents came home, we all went out for a wonderful evening meal at HuHot, with Lindsay and me wearing our shirts.

That day, we also got a chance to go see some of Lindsay's friends.  We saw Jessica, David, and their newest addition, Isabella.  Of course we wanted to hear all about what it was like going through childbirth, so they obliged and told their story.  We stayed until Izzy got hungry, then said our farewells.

We went down to Jefferson City to visit Amy in her apartment, and got "the special treatment" when we arrived.  We had Italian for lunch and had a nice long chat with Amy.  She really is doing well, and it was fun to hang out with her again.

On Friday, we made the trip towards St Louis to see my buddy James and his wife Kristin.  We hadn't seen James since his visit back home after his boot camp, so we had lots of catching up to do.  He said he had two dogs, one husky and one tiny, toy mutt named Dozer (how ironic).  Well, he was slightly off, turned out to be the largest, most gentle dog I've ever met.  We met Kristin and went out for a night on the town, Smithton, Illinois style.  After the visit, we hit the road back to Columbia.

On Saturday, Chuck and Lisa hosted a Mizzou football game party and we got to see all sorts of old friends.  Jane came from next door to share photos and family updates.  Dawn was there along with Daniel, Alison, and her parents.  The Butchers were also there to enjoy the company and game.  Even Amy came to play with Daniel for awhile.  Mizzou didn't win, but we could blame the Obermiers - they were at the game cheering along in the crowd.  Obviously they weren't loud enough :)

For Halloween, we spent all day decorating the house and carving pumpkins.  This was my first time, and I have to say, mine turned out pretty well.  I made a spooky owl and Lindsay made a vampire bat.  Tons of fun!  Kids came and went, and we watched The Rocky Horror Picture Show on streaming Netflix.

Our time in Missouri went by too fast it seemed.  The morning that Chuck and Lisa drove us to the airport was a sad one.  We said farewell at the airport and parted ways... then they went out and had a day of fun in St Louis.  Goodbye America, we'll see you in a few.  Onward to ENGLAND!!

~Blake

Northward to Missouri

It was hard for us to leave Austin because we liked it so much.  That rain that seemed to be following us hit again the morning we left, giving the locals some well-deserved moisture.  It was becoming a common omen to us, but Uncle Rob and Susan thought it was out of the ordinary.

The first stop of the day was to see a buddy of mine in Killeen, Texas.  Since we were driving so close by, we thought it would make a nice breakfast stop, plus a chance to catch up with a good friend.  We ate at a nice little diner with a friendly staff for what turned into a three hour-ish breakfast.  So, at lunch time, we hit the road northward towards Dallas.

We couldn't make it without that rain catching us.  It was coming down so hard that we turned on the radio to listen for any warnings in the area, but when they gave locations, it was given by county, which didn't help us in the least since we had no idea which county we were in.  We finally had to pull over, along with lots of other vehicles, at a rest stop and wait for the rain to let up.  This gave us a nice opportunity for a nap.  We awoke to an empty rest stop with little bits of sun shining through the clouds, making for a pleasant sunset after the storm.

Throughout the journey, we had been checking our GPS's food finder for the closest Steak 'n Shake (didn't exist in California) and we finally found one in Dallas.  It was closed :(  But, we looked for another one, called and confirmed it was open, then found it and had a wonderful meal that brought back many memories of our youth of eating at Steak 'n Shake with friends. 

Since we didn't make it very far during the day light, we wanted to get as far into Oklahoma has possible before we pulled over for the night.  McAlester, Oklahoma was our stop.  They had a Best Western right by the highway and when we went into the office they were playing the Mizzou football game on the TV, so we knew we were in the right place.

The next day, we continued to drive all the way to Springfield, Missouri where we stopped for a visit with Corey.  We did like the locals and went out to eat (going out is more common there than eating at home) and we got another long meal with lots of catching up.  Corey showed us where he worked as a Manager of Operations at a local TV station.  He's pretty much the technical backbone of the whole place.  If anything goes wrong with the systems, Corey's on it.  We also spent some time over at Corey's house where we met is dachshund, Rocky and of course we started missing Cooper.

Later that evening, we drove the three hour journey to Kansas City, where we were greeted and welcomed by the James and Emily Burneson Clan.  The boys had grown so much since the last time we saw them.  We stayed with them for a few days which gave us enough time to hang out with the family and to do some sight seeing of our own.  On Lindsay's birthday, the kids and family surprised her with a cake and sang happy birthday to celebrate the joyous occasion.  One night, we went out for some good old Kansas City BBQ with the family and even got to see my Aunt Susan who drove in to see us from Kansas.  

~Blake

West Texas, Austin, & San Antonio

The next morning's drive was ... unexpected.  Since we were following our GPS's guidance, we didn't take the normal I-10 route into Texas; we took the northern road which took us over the pan-handle and through some interesting towns on our way to Austin.

We left Holloman Air Force Base early, before sun rise, and got an early start on our day.  The route took us towards the dry, sandy, and rocky face of the Sacramento Mountains, but as we crested the top, we were pleasantly surprised with trees, lots of TREES!!  We had stumbled onto a beautiful mountain road with foggy mists rising on the meadows as the sun rose over the mountain's horizon.

As we went further east, the vegetation grew less and less.  When we finally crossed into Texas, only small shrubs and weeds could be seen in the fields, not to mention oil drills.  As we continued along the highway, I started to see objects in the road.  They seemed to be little fuzzy black lines.  I thought they were moving, so I asked Lindsay if she could see them, or if I was just going crazy.  We ended up slowing to a crawl to clearly identify these big Texas caterpillars, who seemed to feed in the cotton fields.

As we drove, my Uncle Rob recommended a place that we stop for an early dinner.  After a few phone calls, internet searches, and iPhone apps downloaded, he finally got us the address that we put into the GPS.  The Hill Top Cafe, outside of Fredericksburg, Texas, was what appeared to be a converted gas station turned restaurant.  Cajun and Greek were their specialties.  Lindsay got the Fried Okra while I tried the Greek Special Tenderloin.  It was magnificent!

We arrived in Austin and were greeted by Rob, Susan, and two fairly large cats (the stars of Rob and Susan's Christmas cards).  We went out for gelato and spent the rest of the evening talking and catching up.  The next day was our tour around Austin.  We started locally, learning about the neighborhoods of Brentwood and Crestview and seeing the hugely famous Wall of Welcome with hundreds of tiles creating a mosaic that spanned a whole block.  We ate lunch at the Little Deli & Pizzeria there behind the Wall, and enjoyed listening to "the history of Rob and Susan," something that I had never bothered to ask until I was old enough to appreciate it.  Later we enjoyed a driving tour of Austin, seeing Zilker Park, their armadillo-shaped city hall, the downtown landscape, even a real Texas high school football game, all from the comfort of the RAV4.  We stopped in South Austin for some fine dining on S. Congress Ave, and for dessert we had cupcakes sold to us from a streamline trailer along the road, Hey Cupcake! (google it)

The next day we went down to San Antonio to spend the day with Lindsay's relatives there.  We arrived and enjoyed a lunch at Applebee's and spent the time catching up with Aunt Kim and Nick.  Seeing them together, it was like they were on a team.  Nick was so helpful to Kim; he even pumped the gas for her at the station.  Kim was watching out for Nick too, making sure he didn't scarf down his food too quick.  After lunch we went back to their apartment, where I got slaughtered by Nick at a video game.

After that, we went to visit Lindsay's grandfather, who unfortunately was in the hospital fighting a bad case of pneumonia.  Due to the nature of the illness, we all had to wear full hospital gown, masks, and gloves, which made chatting a bit difficult, not to mention rather warm.  We did have a wonderful conversation and got to explain our future adventure to England to him.  After a while, we had to leave because he was getting his final tests taken before he could be discharged.  We then went to his home where Edith had prepared a dinner for everyone.  It was so nice of her to prepare a top-notch meal that was both tasty and delicious.  After dinner, Lindsay and I went back to the hospital, where we hoped we could pick Grandpa up to take him home, but the test results were taking too long, so instead we sat and conversed a while longer.  He told us captivating stories from his military career.  It’s amazing how much energy he seemed to have even after overcoming that illness.  Before we left, we managed to sneak in a photo without the hospital garb.  We went back to his home where Edith had dessert for us.  After a few slices of pie, we then started our return journey to Austin. 

The next morning, we had to leave, but we decided that Austin would be quite a nice city to make our home, if our lives ever brought us to Texas.

~Blake