Day 11: Deep in the Heart of Texas

So here we are in Austin, the illustrious Texan capital. We drove in this evening from San Antonio, so we haven't seen much yet. We did, however, do quite a bit of sightseeing in San Antonio. We started our day by visiting Mission Conception, one of the four San Antonio missions that make up the Missions National Park. We walked around and saw the old churches that were used to convert the South Texan Indians to Christianity in the 1700s. It was interesting to see the way of life and all of the history that happened within the walls. We visited Mission San Jose, the "Queen of Missions," before heading into San Antonio center.

Starving, we made our way into the city, in search of what else but good old Tex Mex food. We made our way down to the Riverwalk, which is indeed as cool as people say it is! We found Original Mexican Restaurant, where we enjoyed some of the best Mexican food I have ever had! With full stomachs we wandered down the banks of the river which are lined with restaurants and shops. We walked across little stone bridges and watched boats float along full of eager tourists. Finally we reached The Alamo!

The historic Alamo was packed with tourists, many of which were native Texans, swelling with pride at the history of their beloved state. We walked the halls of the former mission that contained exhibits, including memorabilia from the likes of Davy Crockett. Stories of Texas history were plastered on the walls in an exhaustive manner. Overall it was a good experience to see the famed monument, but I much prefered the silent halls of the missions that showed the wear that hundreds of years and people had left on it. We got a good dose of history before heading to the mall to find Matt proper attire for the upcoming weddings. After our shopping trip, we headed back to the car and drove the hour and a half up to Austin where we are currently staying.

I am looking forward to seeing my cousin Billie and her adorable kids Natalie and Talon, especially since my cousin Jason has just gone back to Iraq this week. We are going to meet up with them tomorrow, and as Matt said, it will be nice to see some familiar faces! Onward and westward!!!

Stats to come.
-Alie

To Houston and To San Antonio Stats

I'm making this a separate post since we have two full days of stats but only one map. So here they are...



We have been to 31% of the USA!

To Houston:
Coming Soon!

To San Antonio Stats:
Overall Average: 55.9mph
Moving Average: 65.2mph
Moving Time: 4h 18m
Stopping Time: 42m 50s
Total Time: 5h 1m
Traveled: 281.3mi

So close yet so far...

Day 9 & 10: Geetings From Texas!

First I’d like to apologize for the posting black out for the past two nights. At our last two hotels we have not had a good internet connection. So Its been difficult to get a post out. However now we have found a wifi hotspot and I can deliver you the last two updates.

Yesterday we went to the Houston Space Center. Which is still completely operational and getting ready for a historic day. The re-launching of the space shuttle fleet! Thus mission control shuttle and mission control space station are both alive with activity. Especially shuttle mission control; they have been going through simulations for the past week or more.

The way the Johnson Space Center works is a little odd. They want an attraction for people to go to, but they also want to show Historic Mission Control and the Training Center. So what they have done is turn a section over to Disney and let them basically design a HUGE kids playplace and the only real adult attractions are space suits, hall of Astronauts and the two tour locations. This would be fine but the entrance fee is very expensive and the flight simulations are $4 each. They obviously know they have you trapped but it seems like every place you turn they try to take money from you. Even when you try to purchase a ticket they try to sell you a combo pass that includes the tour of the facilities and an audio, when in fact a tour of the facilities is included in the regular ticket price.

But after saying all that there is some pretty cool things there. You get to see the mission control room where they controlled all the Gemini Missions, all Apollo Missions, and 77 Shuttle Space Flight Missions. Then we saw the training center which is very cool. What I thought was interesting is that we are able to take as many pictures as we want of the real palces where Astronauts Train but we cannot take pictures of any train on the MBTA.

After we spent the entire day at the museum we traveled to San Antonio where we found a hotel right near the Spanish Missions and the Alamo. I’m VERY excited about both.

So that was Yesterday.

The Day before is much more interesting

When we tried to leave Nawlins our car wouldn’t start. We called AAA they came jumped the Prisus’ battery and told us to take it a Toyota Dealer ASAP. So we took it to Toyota of New Orleans, they did not have anew battery but the good people at Mike Calvert Toyota did and would sell it to us. So we drove the 500 miles to Houston, which we were going to anyways. Oh yeah the final thing AAA told us was to NOT shut the car off. So for 500 miles we didn’t even when we needed a fill up.

We got to the Texas Dealership and left the car there and told them of the problem. We then went to dinner and then our hotel. The next morning around 11am I get a call and they said NOTHING was wrong with it. They allowed us to drive with a Master Mechanic to see if the problem came back and we drove around for 10 minuets or so and it was all fine. I asked the technician and he said a map light might drian the battery if left on but the 500 mile trip after the jump recharged it fine.

The best thing of all is that we did not loose anything but mental angish, not money or time. So knock on wood the car is fine and we will continue on to Austin tomorrow to Alie’s Cousin in law’s house and her children. It should be good to see familiar faces, its been a long time since Jersey.