The ABCs of Starting Over- OR to KY Roadtrip + WDW 50th Ann. Trip 9/28-10/4; Day 6 and REPORT COMPLETE!

[Steppesister]

I too am very happy that someone turned in your rugs! That is a heart-warming story!

But I am confused that you ate dinner at a restaurant in Tucson, AZ while staying in Las Cruces, NM. What am I missing about this? Is there also a Tucson in NM?

It really is!! When I found out, I immediately went in to tell Linda, the B&B owner, and she was elated!

I fixed that!

 

[Steppesister]

Yay, for kind people! So happy your rugs were returned to you!

There are still some good people out there and I too was so happy!

 

[Steppesister]

Sometimes people really do restore your faith in humanity! Delighted for you that you got your rugs back.

For REALS!! I was so happy, and Zach was equally so!

Lundeen Inn of the Arts looks amazing. Such a beautiful place to stay and such a great start to your day with a yummy breakfast and great news about the rugs.

Linda was such a great hostess! I really loved staying there!

 

[Steppesister]

Oh, I get this. I've done 16 hour runs and not taken a single photo. Still enjoy all the scenery, though.

Sometimes it's good just to be in the moment and enjoy without feeling pressured to "document" it all.

Not quite sure what you mean by this?
There were a lot of slow pickup trucks with hunters? Or is this referring to something like switchbacks?

Lots of slow pickups looking for camping spots or their turnoff, or they were slow because heavy or...

Always leery of gas station food.

Yeah, but this was a deli too.

Interesting observation. I took it for a prosperous home owner.

Certainly could have been. There was no placquard or anything.

Google just doesn't appreciate art!

Nope! LOL!

Interesting you both thought the same thing.

Great minds and all that.

Now that I would never have thought of.

I thought it was pretty genius.

1. "studies"???? You mean they're together in the afterlife planning a new building?

2. okay, okay... still... that's... pretty amazing that he did.

Sorry!!! Typo!!

I can't imagine there were many who did.

Whoa. Good thing you had such a filling lunch! You were still probably starved, though?

No, the sadness of losing our rugs was a great antihunger thing.

Cool! Not just William Bonney, but Kit Carson and Pancho Villa too?!?!?!?!? Holy cow! History in a bottle!

Pretty amazing, no?!

The sounds of good food.

(Well, maybe not the parrots...)

I dunno, I hear parrot tastes pretty good.

Just a word of warning... or perhaps a word of advice, depending on your point of view? You might not want that if you're going to be seeing your gentlemen friends of the day before... noticed that one is an aphrodisiac...

Owned some, years ago. About that size, too. (I'm guessing about 6" long?)

About that, yes!

I think they're oscars... pretty wicked fish too, but no teeth.

I've only ever had guppies and angel fish, so don't know a lot about other tank fish.

Now that you've been to Bowling Green, should you go back (you said you might) do you think you might buy something?

And is all that art on display for sale??

Yes, it is. And I'm not sure. It'd really have to stand out for me to plunk a couple hundred bucks on.

Who knows what it was, but it was good!

!

 

[Steppesister]

I'm glad that you posted the map. You are exploring a lot of the Southwest.

Yes, we sure did!! Loads, and now, we'll start to leave that area and head to the deep South.

The bed and breakfast is gorgeous. I'm surprised that Google didn't know where it was since it is obviously a great destination.

It really was very, very nice. Not overly ostentatious, but comfortable and interesting. Very welcoming. Google did, but it was dark and it's set back in a funky laid out neighborhood.

I'm not surprised that someone turned in the lost rugs. There are more good people out there than bad ones.

It was sure a nice surprise and a happy phone call!

 

[Steppesister]

So happy the rugs were found and turned in!! It's always nice to hear that good people still exist in this crazy world we live in!

Looks like a lovely home to spend the evening in, and the margaritas were definitely well-deserved!

Us too! That was a lot of money to lose for Z especially! As for crazy...

Such a lovely place to find. Definitely a keeper on the Las Cruces list of "good places"!

 

[Steppesister]

Yay for the lost rugs being turned in and getting back to you!

(And I was wondering if anyone would comment on the "studies with FLLW" bit, but I see Pkondz took care of that, lol)

YES!!! Huge "yay"!!

Yep, typed an "s" for a "d". HUGE difference!

 

[Steppesister]

Oh my goodness! I am so glad you got the rugs back! There ARE good people in the world
And congratulations on beginning your next degree!

Yes, there certainly are! Very refreshing for sure!

And thanks!! Lots to studying to get through for sure!

 

[Steppesister]

That's certainly a relief!

Hey Andy, long time, no see! Glad you're back!

Yes, it certainly was!

So much better than 1 for $1300

Well, there were those too, but not for this budget! LOL!

Fun way to make a few friends over breakfast.

It was a lot of fun. Nice to see that people can be friendly and welcoming in this crazy world we live in.

Oh no... not my rugs and just reading that almost made me feel sick.

Trust me, there was sickness to be felt!

That's fantastic news! I'm glad they were found and returned to you.

YES!!!

 

[Steppesister]

Oh joy! Always a great time.

Or not.

Interesting! I bet she could tell a lot of great stories.

Yes, she certainly was!! She talked a lot about how the piano was brought in by her father? A super old one if I remember that came from the Old World by boat.

Don't tap on the glass! Or stick a finger in there.

Chomp!

That's quite a lot of art. I guess it makes sense, given her vocation.

I got the distinct feeling she was of the old Tucson socialite crowd that hobnobs with the well-to-do, but so welcoming and sweet with not even a speck of snobbishness in her air.

Thank goodness! So glad this had a happy ending.

For reals!! I as actually very dumbfounded!

 

[Steppesister]

Celebrity fades with time. Only the very, very few are iconic enough to withstand the erosion of time.

Very, very true.

noooooooooo...

Yeah, a major oversight on my part! Oops!!

Definitely an oversight.

I mean, a tub takes a hotel room up about 10 notches!!

You do at drive-thrus.

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/...ontribute-to-900-vehicle-pay-it-forward-chain

I've done that actually.

 

[Steppesister]

C is for: Clearly You ARE Food;
Day 11 and Day 12, Pt 1​

DAY 11- Most Boringest Day EVER!

There is no better way to start off a day than to have over $800 recovered. To say we were elated would be a gross understatement. With a renewed spring in our steps, we proceeded to sit on our butts for the next 9 hours. We’d diddled around in Arizona for so long that now it was time to really lay some tracks to our travels! Texas is large. You can drive for what seems like 9 years and still be in Texas. Trust me, this day felt like 9 years. We pulled off into some no-namer town about halfway between Las Cruces and San Antonio (don’t ask, I have zero idea what it was) and found some semi-decent food. If I recall we split a Reuben or something and some fries. It was uneventful and we still had the other 9 years of Texas travel to go.

Oddly, in a couple of days, when we traveled from San Antonio to our next stop in Louisiana, we’d still have about 9 years left. If you think I’m exaggerating, you’ve clearly never driven I-10 through Texas. It’s flat and boring and occasionally punctuated by a lonely ranch with few cattle running on it. If you’re lucky there’s a McDonalds to pee at in time. Then again, I’m old and that distance is becoming exponentially shorter with each passing year. But I digress…

Sorry, the beginning of this chapter is as boring as the drive. I took exactly 0 photos of the flat landscape.

​

Miraculously, Zach and I made it to our KOA campground before dark and got checked in. We asked the staff where their favorite BBQ was and luckily it wasn’t too far off (about a year in Texas drive time). They recommended Augie’s BBQ, so we headed out for some grub.

http://augiesbbq.com/

​

Texas Rule #1- Eat BBQ. I’m a ribs kind of gal. And I like my sauce sweet and spicy. They had those, as all decent Texas BBQ places should, but they also had chopped brisket which Z wanted to try. We split a dinner and got the 2 meats and 2 sides which was more than enough. It came with some Texas Toast, sliced raw onion, and some dill pickles on the side. When you sit for 9 hours days you don’t really get very hungry. Satiated, we zipped back to the KOA and set up our “camp”. Camp consisted of our bags in the back, and we were tired enough that we simply went to bed. I wanted to get an early start on the next day’s sight-seeing. Texas Rule #2- Do NOT sleep outside. Ever.

DAY 12- San Antonio Sight Seeing

We were up all night long. Literally. By morning I was one giant welt with (again, I do not exaggerate) about 400 mosquito bites which, and I cannot even believe I would ever say this, was far worse than the bed bug extravaganza from Ashfork. I was absolutely miserable and immediately went to the office to A) buy some Benedryl and, B) tell them that we either had to be given a cabin for the next night or we’d have to check out. We simply could not do that again. Luckily, they did have a very rudimentary, basic cabin available for only a small upcharge and we took it. Suffice to say, my hoped-for early start was delayed by a lot. We had to pack up and move over to our cabin which ate up another hour. Ah well, better than being eaten ourselves again that night.

Finally, we were able to take off and first went in search of coffee and breakfast. The place we found was great! I got a croissant and a latte, and Z ordered some lox and cheese on toast with a chai latte. Next door was a car wash. If you’ve ever driven through the South in Summer, you have a good idea of what my car looked like.

​

I felt like crap and just wanted to sleep. But Texas Rule #3 states that when you’re driving through it and have never seen the Alamo, you must. Unfortunately, this collides with Steppe Rule #1- Don’t wait in line to see a tourist trap, especially if it involves spending any money whatsoever. (Disney is the one notable exception to this rule.) A corollary to this rule is never pay for premium parking. I drove a few extra blocks and found some metered parking which involved not that much extra walking. I snapped a few photos of the Scottish Rite Cathedral I found pretty along the way.

(The face your toddler makes when you serve them the meal you spent an hour making after they've specifically asked for that.)​

The line to go into the actual Alamo building that everyone knows was hella long and since it was both hot and expensive, we decided to just walk around the monument and see what else there was to see. It was somewhat amusing, and we did enjoy what we saw, but I wasn’t bowled over with the wow factor I thought it might have. It was just simply too touristy for my taste. Enjoy the few photos I did get. I particularly enjoyed the ginormous Live Oak, the cannons, and black powder gun this guy had to show.

​

Unfortunately, the Benedryl was catching up to me and I was quickly becoming a walking zombie. Between that and the heat, I could barely keep my eyes open and the rest of the day was rough going.

There is still quite a bit to our couple of days in San Antonio so stay tuned… I’ll spare you the suspense and tell you now that Steppe did not end up in the Emergency Room for a blood transfusion.

 

[pkondz]

Sometimes it's good just to be in the moment and enjoy without feeling pressured to "document" it all.

Lots of slow pickups looking for camping spots or their turnoff, or they were slow because heavy or...

ohhh... okay. Got it now.

I thought it was pretty genius.

But thankfully you didn't have to use it.

I thought it was pretty genius.

Unfortunately with the new DIS, if you quote something twice... you can't get rid of it anymore.

I can't imagine there were many who did.

I have no idea. Maybe?

No, the sadness of losing our rugs was a great antihunger thing.

Ugh. Yeah, I can see that.

Pretty amazing, no?!

I dunno, I hear parrot tastes pretty good.

Yes, it is. And I'm not sure. It'd really have to stand out for me to plunk a couple hundred bucks on.

Impressive.
And of course. No point in buying art you don't like.

 

[pkondz]

Yeah, a major oversight on my part! Oops!!

Whoops!

I mean, a tub takes a hotel room up about 10 notches!!

I've done that actually.

So have I.

 

[Wood Nymph]

Texas is large. You can drive for what seems like 9 years and still be in Texas. Trust me, this day felt like 9 years.

I've experienced the 9 years drive through Texas, too. It was during a Geology trip during spring break when I was in college. We traveled from central Illinois, which added some more years to the trip. Some of the destinations included Big Bend National Park and Carlsbad Caverns in New Mexico. The highlights of the trip included the gorgeous caverns, the armadillo walking around our campground and one of the Geology professors getting bitten by a scorpion (which is why you don't sleep outdoors in Texas). At least the weather was nice.

Texas Rule #3 states that when you’re driving through it and have never seen the Alamo, you must. Unfortunately, this collides with Steppe Rule #1- Don’t wait in line to see a tourist trap, especially if it involves spending any money whatsoever.

This is a good rule. We don't like tourist traps, either.

 

[pkondz]

DAY 11- Most Boringest Day EVER!

Then I guess I don't have to read further.

Well... there seems to be more, so I guess I'll stick around.

There is no better way to start off a day than to have over $800 recovered.

I bet! You must've been grinning ear to ear.

With a renewed spring in our steps, we proceeded to sit on our butts for the next 9 hours.

Anti-climactic.

Texas is large.

I've hear rumours of that.

You can drive for what seems like 9 years and still be in Texas. Trust me, this day felt like 9 years.

So... you're saying this was a long day?

We pulled off into some no-namer town about halfway between Las Cruces and San Antonio (don’t ask, I have zero idea what it was)

Fort Stockton.

Hey, it's your map.

Oddly, in a couple of days, when we traveled from San Antonio to our next stop in Louisiana, we’d still have about 9 years left. If you think I’m exaggerating, you’ve clearly never driven I-10 through Texas. It’s flat and boring and occasionally punctuated by a lonely ranch with few cattle running on it.

So similar in size and excitement to driving across the prairies.

If you’re lucky there’s a McDonalds to pee at in time.

So do you pee at from a moving car? Or do you get out and pee at it on foot?
If the latter, how do you do that without getting arrested? Or do you flee before the cops show up?

Then again, I’m old and that distance is becoming exponentially shorter with each passing year.

Sorry, the beginning of this chapter is as boring as the drive. I took exactly 0 photos of the flat landscape.

Yeah... same here, when driving through Saskatchewan.

We asked the staff where their favorite BBQ was and luckily it wasn’t too far off (about a year in Texas drive time).

but they also had chopped brisket which Z wanted to try.

I was wondering what that was! That seems... odd? I wonder why it has to be chopped. Do you put it on the bread?

Texas Rule #2- Do NOT sleep outside. Ever.

My first thought was "Snakes?"
Of course, I read on...

We were up all night long. Literally. By morning I was one giant welt with (again, I do not exaggerate) about 400 mosquito bites which, and I cannot even believe I would ever say this, was far worse than the bed bug extravaganza from Ashfork.

we either had to be given a cabin for the next night or we’d have to check out.

Or roll up your windows.

Luckily, they did have a very rudimentary, basic cabin available for only a small upcharge and we took it.

Phew!

If you’ve ever driven through the South in Summer, you have a good idea of what my car looked like.

Pristine? Like new?

That looks really inviting.

But Texas Rule #3 states that when you’re driving through it and have never seen the Alamo, you must.

I would think so. You're certainly not allowed to forget it.

Unfortunately, this collides with Steppe Rule #1- Don’t wait in line to see a tourist trap, especially if it involves spending any money whatsoever.

Is this like the immovable object and the irresistible force?

I snapped a few photos of the Scottish Rite Cathedral I found pretty along the way.

Bigger than I thought!

Quasimodo?

(The face your toddler makes when you serve them the meal you spent an hour making after they've specifically asked for that.)

The line to go into the actual Alamo building that everyone knows was hella long and since it was both hot and expensive, we decided to just walk around the monument and see what else there was to see. It was somewhat amusing,

"somewhat amusing"
Isn't it a big deal (historically speaking) in your country? I sure got that impression.

Love this shot!
All your shots are great, but this one stood out, for me.

Unfortunately, the Benedryl was catching up to me and I was quickly becoming a walking zombie.

Oh dear...

I’ll spare you the suspense and tell you now that Steppe did not end up in the Emergency Room for a blood transfusion.

Well, that's good at least!
You must've itched something fierce, though.

 

[DaisyDuck001]

The barbecue sauce gets absorbed better if the brisket is chopped.

 

[pkondz]

The barbecue sauce gets absorbed better if the brisket is chopped.

Thanks! Had no idea... and makes perfect sense.
Do you usually put it on the bread? Or eat it with a fork?

Sorry to hijack your thread, Steppesister

 

[DaisyDuck001]

Some restaurants serve it on a slice of bread, and others serve it without bread. I would eat it with a fork regardless.

 

[missjackiemcg]

Rob and I went to the wedding of one of our college friends in San Antonio a few years ago. We were so excited to visit The Alamo while we were there. Let me set your mind at ease--you didn't miss anything much inside. It was so full of people when we visited, too, that we couldn't barely get close enough to read the signage that was displayed, and we spent much more time taking in the same things you mentioned/pictured outdoors.

I hope your visit included a stroll on the Riverwalk! Our visit was short, but we really enjoyed that while there!