Meet Zelda! Part 2

But what about Part 1?

There were several straight days of this on the trip

As you read in the last blog, Day 1 of our trip to Hammond, Louisiana to bring home Zelda, the new travel trailer, was uneventful, taking us from Phoenix to El Paso, Texas and into the warm embrace of the Fairfield Inn near the airport.  Of course, I woke up earlier than necessary, so I got in a run on the hotel's treadmill before barging back into the room to find Chris already awake and starting to move around.

So many clouds -

also, so many bugs.

Yum.

Day 2 would be our longest driving day, moving us 830 miles further east, to yet another Fairfield Inn, this time in Beaumont, Texas (like I mentioned in the last blog, it takes a hot minute to get out of this giant state).  Since this would take us around 12 hours (and we'd lose an hour when we changed from Mountain to Central time), we hit the road by 7am, after enjoying the hot breakfast sandwich option at the Fairfield and spending a few minutes chatting with another visitor (she saw my Long Beach Half Marathon t-shirt and mentioned she'd lived there - even weirder, she grew up about 5 blocks away from our current house in Phoenix - this world, it is very small sometimes).  With a quick stop at Starbucks, we were underway!

Back when Chris was still working on his degree, he did an internship with the Citgo Refinery in Corpus Christi; the town of Fort Stockton was halfway between Corpus and home, so it served as our overnight spot when we moved him out for the summer, and a few months later, when we moved him back.  My Dad and brother Jim accompanied us on the trip to move him home, and after checking into our lodging for the night, we went in search of dinner.  Most of the spots there at the time were on the lower end of the chain restaurant spectrum, and when we saw that the golf course had a clubhouse serving food, we decided to try it out.  The four of us walked in to an absolute ghost town of a restaurant - we were the only folks there (keep this in mind later - it will be important).  The host/server/short order cook (probably) was overjoyed to see us; she seated us, took our orders for drinks and fried pickles, and left us with our menus.  She was back in a jiffy, and we conveyed our dinner selections - three BLTs and one club sandwich.  

We enjoyed the pickles and beers, as well as the broadcast of The Dukes of Hazzard playing in the corner of the room, and about 20 minutes later, our server emerged again, bearing a tray of food.  She set down the club sandwich, then three BLTs, then looked totally stumped.  Somehow, there was still a BLT remaining on her tray, and she'd clearly served all four of us, the grand total of her current clientele, our dinners.  She figured what the heck and gave it to us for free, and we made quick work of it.  It wasn't until she walked away that we noticed the many, many empty Lone Star bottles on the bar, and we figured out how she'd been killing time while waiting for the "dinner rush."

The beginning of San Antonio Friday

afternoon rush hour.

Lovely.

Hi, downtown!

As we continued driving, the 10 took us through San Antonio, Hill Country, then through Houston, where we paused on the eastern side of the city for an outstanding dinner at Craft Burger in Katy.  

My chicken sandwich -

kind of hard to eat, but oh so delicious

Chris with his burger and onion rings

Eventually, we made it out of Houston and into Beaumont, pulling into the Fairfield Inn, our lodging for the night around 9:30-10pm, completely beat (we actually wandered into the Courtyard Marriott first, got really confused, then figured out we were staying next door instead - dang, near identical Marriott properties!).  We sacked out hard, happy to have our longest day on the road behind us!

Day 3 found us up early again; while our drive to Hammond wouldn't be too long (only about 3.5 hours), we needed to be there by 11am, so another 7am departure was in the cards.  We made another stop at Starbucks, this time for food and beverages (as we were up too soon for the weekend breakfast at the hotel), and before we departed Beaumont, we had to pause and take pictures at one of their local landmarks - the World's Largest Working Fire Hydrant!

It is very, very big.

Please notice Chris' Tennessee t-shirt...

With that very important business handled, it was time to finally make it out of Texas and get into Cajun country!  By the time an hour passed, we were in Louisiana, crossing the bridge in Lake Charles.

Sunrise breaking through the clouds

Chris tried to catch the "Welcome to Louisiana" sign,

but this was what he got instead.

This area of the country is just beautiful, particularly as you pass through the Atchafalaya National Wildlife Refuge.  The road here is elevated to avoid damaging the fragile areas below, and it's a lovely drive.

Looking out over the estuaries and mangroves

You can see the elevated roads here,

past the scary engine truck thing

Before too much longer, we were outside Baton Rouge, where we ran into traffic, likely caused by the football game that day in Tiger Stadium against...the Tennessee Volunteers.  The Vols won, and Chris did not get shivved for wearing a TN shirt, so that worked out okay in the end.

Yet another large bridge -

there are a lot in this area of the country

Crossing the Mississippi with the city in the background

Outside of Baton Rouge, we detoured off the 10 for the first time in this trip, to take the 12 another hour or so to Hammond, where we'd finally meet Zelda!  Look for that in the next blog entry!

Later!

Amy