Stop! Have you read our previous posts? Click above if you want to read from the beginning.
Florida to Texas (with a little detour to New York)
We left Florida regretfully - we are sure we will return here again (on a way back perhaps?)
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New Orleans – Louisiana – November 28th 2011
We’ve just spent the most amazing 5 days in the heart of Jazz and Soul Music and the most magnificent food – the New Orleans!
Someone in our previous campground recommended we stay in this campground close to town which at first scared us as we had to drive through a very industrial area which obviously had been very effected by Hurricane ‘Katrina’ some 6 years ago now.
But once we got to the campground, we relaxed! Not only was it great and gated but it had an awesome bar where even though it had ‘ not under 18’s’ sign on it – we spent some good times in there.
First we met the barman Matt, when we first arrived and we asked him to see the movie, which was played twice a day about Hurricane Katrina. He movie was incredible and it made us realize why there were so many run down homes around. 75% of the town, after being severely damaged by the hurricane, got totally flooded. There were some 3000 people killed in the process. Very, very sad.
After we watched the movie we got into a serious conversation with Matt who we found out in the process was the boss barman – hence the ‘lift on the rules’
Matt became our great buddy and even allowed us to help him make pizzas for our parents and us. He was quite impressed with our skills although not so impressed with the state of kitchen afterwards. The pizzas sure were SUPER cheesy. And so was the kitchen!
Matt introduced us to all the locals (who are currently working on construction as the campground is expending). We met a pirate ‘ the Smiling Dog’ with his adorable dog, Jessie
We met Jo’ Bear who we tight up at the bar (shoelaces and all) and who paid us $10 ransom to get his freedom back.
And we met Katie who also worked at the bar. Matt told her to bring all sorts of beads to work the next night, which kept us busy for hours. We made necklaces and ear- rings for everybody!
We spent 5 lovely days in New Orleans. It is an incredible city which literally sits on wet-lands. All roads are just massive, massive bridges – the longest ones we have ever seen! All homes, shops and even driveways are stump reinforced. Mum recons it would be cheaper to relocate the whole town than build this infrastructure but they obviously like it that way.
They have even built all graves above the ground because 6ft underground is……swamp! And as Katie (the bar lady) explained to us – no one wants to find these people swimming the next day…
Downtown, New Orleans is very pretty especially one of the streets St. Charles in the French Quarter area, which was lined with massive stunning mansions, a striking contrast to other, much poorer areas.
One of the most beautiful daytrips we took was to the famous Alley Valley Sugar Cane Plantation, an hour out of New Orleans. Actually, we are not sure how famous it is here, but in our house it sure always had been. See mummy and daddy had a picture of this Plantation above their bed for the last 7 years. Mummy fell in love with this picture (especially this beautiful oak driveway) when she met Ken Duncan (famous Australian Photographer). She bought this picture for an absolute fortune. And here she is snapping it herself…
We sometimes walked the streets at night listening to the beautiful music of Jazz. Most bars had life performers with windows open so although we weren’t allowed to go in (too young) we could listen to them while walking by.
We also met some street performers who played the saxophone, carnets and other fancy instruments…
We even enjoyed our dinner once while listening to this wonderful band. Of course we joined them for the performance. This lady looks like she is wearing a metal dress. This is actually her instrument – she plays it with a bunch of spoons. Cool!
On our last day in N.O. we went to visit someone we met in Oregon. Well, daddy met Tom while replacing tires on our car. Tom, a retired doctor, travels in a massive coach with his wife and a beautiful dog - for 6 months every year. They either cruise on a stunning boat or live in a beautiful home in New Orleans for the rest of the year. What a life!
In the evening we went to our favourite, kids friendly (chain) restaurant - Margaritaville. We got to try local treat - Gator Bites. Yep, you guessed it - an alligator! It tasted like chicken (of course) but a chewy, chewy version.
On our last night in New Orleans we went to this magnificent Christmas Celebration in the local botanical garden, which was spectacularly decorated in stunning Christmas lights. It was so beautiful!
They even had a carnival happening and we went on a few great rides.
It was hard to say goodbye to our new buddy Matt. We will always remember him as the ‘New Oreland’s Super Pizza Man’ as he certainly made the best pizzas in town.
Austin - December 2011
Our friend in Los Angeles, Mitch has given us details of his cousin Marc in Austin and told us to visit him while we are there. We only popped in to say G’day but ended spending over a week with them.
Marc, Miriam and their awesome son Asa (aka ‘Ace Man’) were fantastic and so hospitable! Not only did they allow us to park in their oversize driveway for a whole week but they also looked after our humble home while we ducked out to New York for a week (tell you about this later)
We loved having Asa to play with. He is 6 years old and he loves soccer….just like us!
On our first day, upon our arrival in Austin, we were invited by Miriam, Marc and Asa to go to a fantastic cinema, where you can order and eat brunch while you watch a movie. It was fantastic (and so was the movie – Puss in Boots)
During our stay in Austin (while Asa was at school) we did a few day trips. We started with a shopping mall. After traveling for so long between Canada and Texas where there weren’t many opportunities to shop Mummy started to get what she called ‘withdrawal syndrome’. Not sure what she means by that but we sure spent a long time at the shops.
As mummy and daddy were trying things on we figured we needed to entertain ourselves (and others of course). We put some outfits on and we stood at the display window pretending to be mannequins. And when someone looked at us... we moved – which first scared them and then made them lough out-loud. They were even taking pictures of us - we 'become' famous!
Soon we progressed to inviting people into the shop and telling them about all the great deals the shop had on offer. The manager though we were fabulous and should become models! Well, maybe we will...
The next day we went to town to Children’s museum, which although very little kept us occupied the whole day.
They even had a pretend kitchen with pretend food in there - we plaid there for hours.
One day we ventured off into the ‘art garage’ where we learned how to make tie-die T-shirts. We got right into it and had fantastic time.
Do you like what we created?
Marc and Miriam were so much fun, they even did a dance night for us. We did a concert and boogied with them till late. It was so much fun!
On one of our days out we went to the Book People shop (sort of Borders style) and we stayed there for hours. They had a fantastic children’s section where we could just sit and read books.
They also had a local youth group play some Christmas tunes for us, which was totally awesome!
New York, New York
We've been thinking about experiencing White Christmas. Our initial plan was to fly up to Colorado which is not too far north of Texas but after our parents researched the prices over Christmas time, they started contemplating whether it's worth going. To hire a car from the airport to get to one of the nicer ski areas would cost as much as flying from Teas to Colorado. Ouch! So, we figured that maybe we'll leave our 'home' behind and drive there instead.
However after a couple of phone calls we have discovered that the snow has not yet arrived there and so we figured we might have a better bet getting into the 'Christmas Spirit' in the incredible New York. And so we did!
We’ve just spent the most beautiful 6 days in the city that never sleeps – incredible New York! Oh, what a beautiful city it is!
We’ve jammed so many things into those 5 days but we certainly returned back to Texas with our souls full of Christmas Spirit!
We stayed in a nice hotel, which was walking distance to literally everything. We did lots and lots of walking taking in all the beautiful sites: the lights, the traffic noise (which after a few days sounded like music), the people who came from all over the world, the coordinated chaos – it was just awesome!
There were so many people, so many cars - it was so cool! Their parking lots were even stacked up to cater for the overload...
On our first day, after arriving at midday (4hrs flight from Texas) we spent the whole day in the Central Park which incidentally is like no other park we have ever seen – it is a 826 acre botanical spectacular (it has 26,000 planted trees and has 19 entrances!).
"These percales are making us thirsty"
As the sun sets pretty early at this time of the year (4:30pm) we jumped on a tie-cab bicycle and got a tour all the way around the park so that we got our bearings right. It was fun although it started
getting so cold that our limbs were like ice … by the time we got back.
A hot chocolate in a nearby restaurant defrosted us pretty fast through, lol
We went to the markets and checked out a beautiful shopping mall where we rode the escalators up and down to see from which view the decorations look best. They were just spectacular!
We finished the day with a beautiful meal in the nearby Mexican Restaurant (oh, we are getting so fond of Mexican food)
On the following day (day 2) we got onto a double decker bus, which took us all the way around the city. We could hop on and out wherever we wanted as they run every 25 minutes.
We jumped out at lunchtime and went to check out Tom’s Restaurant which is the famous restaurant used in Sainfield show.
Not sure what the fuss is all about; it was claustrophobically small, chocker blocs with people from all over the world (guess Sainfield is very famous), looked nothing like the one on the show and had the worst hot chocolate we have ever tried (and also worst coffee - daddy tells us).
We took the tour bus back to continue our tour and in the evening we hopped out at Times Square where we marveled at this incredible place, strolling through shops and watching street performes.
We finished our day with a meal at Hard Rock Café. We were told there was a 50 min waiting list and looking around it looked like this kind of wait would be in all the other restaurants as well. Which is probably nothing considering in another 2-3 weeks this area will be packed with close to 3 million people counting down the seconds to New Year.
After putting our name on the list we went to the bar and met an awesome waitress who told us that we can jump the line and eat in the ‘bar section’ – which of course we did! LOL. She (Tara) became our new good friend!
Once we finished our dinner, we joined the crowds outside. We met the girls from the Chicago musical and a lot of other performers. We even came across this fellow who was drumming on….buckets! Gosh, he was good! Bella didn’t even think twice before she joined him, dancing hip-hop to his awesome music. People cheered and took pictures and with laughter dug into their pockets. When the man finished playing he got up, asked everyone to applause Bella and took money out of his backed and paid Bella a tip. She loved the attention. Here is an extract from the ‘show’
On a way back to the hotel (which was only a few streets up) we went pass an M&M store – a massive three story building full of chocolate – yummmmm!!! After ‘arming’ ourselves with enough energy to last us the whole week, we walked back and fell asleep to the sound of traffic and police and fire sirens, which are a constant part of the background noise in this beautiful city.
Our bus trip included also another day on the bus and also a ferry tour. After enjoying another beautiful New York-an brunch (oh, those bagels!) we hopped on the bus and this time went to downtown (another part of NY). He hopped out at one stage to warm up (the top of the bus was uncovered hence freezing cold). We asked someone, which way did the ferry leave from. He pointed in one direction and said ‘right at the end of this road, walking distance’. And so we decided to walk.
After a few blocks down there was a massive traffic jam with a police barricading off one side of the road. The traffic controller was trying to navigate people through but after a truck clipped a buss – all traffic stopped and it became very chaotic with horns beeping everywhere.
Suddenly, there were police cars coming from everywhere. They flew around the corner and we counted 21 vehicles, all with flashing sirens and screeching wheels. It was awesome to watch! Some private cars tried to do u-turns to extract themselves from the traffic just to be yelled at by the police through megaphones. It was ACE! They went past so quickly that mummy couldn’t even get to her camera fast enough to snap some pictures. And when we questioned our parents about what was happening, mummy said she was sure they were only just filming another American Movie. Cool!
After walking all the way to the water’s edge we discovered that we were on a total opposite side of Manhattan to where we should have been. Yes, they had ferries here but they were going to New Jersey and not to Statue of Liberty… Ooops!
As we didn’t have enough change for the bus (have to have exact amount) we had to walk ALL the way back to the other side of the Manhattan Island on foot.
The good thing about having to walk was that we came across a lot of interesting places, shops and people. We even ducked into a Grand Central Station, which looked more like an international airport than a train station. It was beautiful!
We ‘recharged our batteries’ by scuffing down some yummy Christmas cookies freshly baked at the station.
By the time we got to the ferry it was time for a sunset cruise, which ended up being great. Putting aside the freezing temperature, the views were incredible. The Statue of Liberty nicely glowed as the sun ducked down behind her.
The bus took us back to town and we walked around the Rockefeller Centre admiring the beautiful, massive Christmas Tree and watching people ice skate.
From the distance we heard some music and so after investigating it we realized that there were a couple of Mexican Fellows from Salvation Army playing Christmas Music and raising funds. SO we did as one would expect……we joined them! Within minutes there were massive crowds around us, taking pictures and filming us, laughing and digging into their pockets for donations. Some people even came up to us to give us money but we popped it all back into the fund raising bucket – it was all going to a good cause! We love the Salvos!
Day 4 in New York was what you would call a perfect day! We started with yummy waffles for brunch. Oh, the food is soooo yummy in New York!
After that we went to watch a ‘Christmas Spectacular’ show in Radio City Theatre. It was tremendous. A mix between fantastic musical, performance and 3D animation. WOW!
After that our parents took us to the ‘American Girl’ shop which was a David Jones style massive 4 level store with….dolls! Oh, yeah!
There were all sorts of dolls: blond ones, dark ones, redheads, with green eyes, blue eyes and brown ones. One could pick a doll which looks almost like any child in the sore. There were also hundreds of different outfits, for kids and their dolls! On the first floor there was a doll hairdresser where for $20 you could get your dolls hair platted or cropped. Their had little chairs for the dolls to sit on and aprons to wear.
There was also a beauty salon where both the doll and their little owner could have their nails painted or cucumbers applied to their tired eyes.
There was a custom t-shirt printer where you could have t-shirts designed to match with your doll’s.
There was a baby doll section, with all the bells and whistles and outfits of all sorts.
There was a doll’s pet and accessory section and to top it all off – there was a restaurant upstairs where you could have lunch with your doll. Matching silverware – of course.
We skipped the lunch part because you had to make reservations way in advance but we did manage to persuade our parents to buy us a couple of dolls (albeit smaller ones). We walked out absolutely thrilled while our parents were totally dazed by the amount of money they have just forked out. Ouch!
We then went to the Rockefeller Centre again but this time we got to ice skate with mummy for two hours! Daddy had to stay behind to keep an eye on our dolls. We had a ball skating to the most beautiful Christmas music ever!
And when we finished we went looking for our Salvo friends to join them for another hour of fun raising funds for those in need while dancing our hearts out.
On the way home we came across some food vendors who made us yummy dinner and we walked back to the hotel.
We played with the dolls for the rest of the evening and we even created a beauty salon for our dolls and our parents.
And then we just cuddled up in bed and fell asleep to our New York’s lullaby – the busy traffic and police sirens in the background…..
If this was not a beautiful day, we don’t know what is!
On day 5 of our trip to NY we got adventurous and hopped on a train in the nearby subway to downtown. It was great, clean and efficient.
When we hopped off, we decided to visit and pay respect at ‘Ground 0’. After walking for miles to obtain visitor passes from the Visitor Centre and going through a rigorous check through security (boots, belts and all) we got through to their memorial park which was built in place of the Twin Towers which went down 11 years ago. Mummy explained to us what happened on 9/11 which left us in tears and so we paid respect to the many people who died that day.
They are currently replacing the towers next door but on the place of the footprint of those two buildings they built beautiful granite waterfalls with names of people who perished engraved all the way around them.
At night these waterfalls project a light into the sky forever reminding people of what has been lost.
We then walked to Wall Street to see where the action takes place.
We even located the famous CHARGING BULL. Unfortunately they locked him up in an enclosure with a police car guarding it – mummy said they were worried about losing their ‘bull power’. Not sure what she meant…it didn’t look like it was going anywhere.
We took the subway back to the Grand Central Station to admire it some more and then our parents had another surprise for us….they managed to get tickets for Mary Poppins Broadway Musical. Woohoo! We’ve missed it when it was in Melbourne so we were thrilled we were going to see it!
And it was fabulous! Right after it finished Bella jumped on mummy with the biggest hug saying ‘Mummy, thank you so much, this was the best present ever’. We both loved Mary Poppins!
We finished our day with Hard Rock Café where we went to visit our new friend – Tara. We gave her big hugs and she gave us Hard Rock pins to remember her forever.
On a way back to the hotel we stopped at a sports shop where we met a lovely chap who let us get all dressed up in cool sports gear.
He even played gym with us a while. It was so cool!
Our last day in New York we spent packing up in the morning and enjoying sunshine in the Grand Central Park.
We walked for hours and hours playing in the playgrounds and enjoying different performers.
We danced to American Indian music, we listen to beautiful saxophone, we admired some opera singers under the bridge.
We have also joined in the dance performance of some African American muscle man performance who did a fabulous hip hop acrobatic dance show.
They were fantastic. Jordi was even selected to come up and have a man jump over her (and 5 others) with a flip. Oh, it was fantastic.
We also met Brian from Africa who taught us how to play African drums and bongos. We had a whole band going…
Bella even shred a tear when we had to say goodbye to catch a plane.
We certainly will never forget our trip to New York. After all, the city has certainly trumped everything we have ever experienced before; with it’s busy life, noisy traffic, fabulous food, incredible displays and stunning architecture. Oh, New York, New York – we love you!
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We got back to Austin just for one more night. As much as we enjoyed our new friends company, we didn’t want to overstay our welcome. He couldn’t wait for Asa to finish his school – we even went with Miriam to pick him up.
We played together for the rest of the day and in the evening we had a sleepover in Asa’s playroom with a babysitter – while Asa’s and our parents went ‘boogying’. Marc is also a DJ (we got to play with his fancy mixers and instruments during the day). They said they had a great night (they must’ve – they walked in ‘slow motion’ the next day, LOL).
The time had come when we had to say goodbye to our friends (the worst part of our road trip…). We are sure we will see them again sometime in the future.
And some more of TEXAS - December 2011
During our parents ‘boogy night outing’ they met a girl who told them that we must stop in a town called ‘Gruene’ which is only 1hr south of Austin. We’ve never heard of the town but we figured if someone is recommending it, then why not check it out?
We found an RV park, which on the website looked fantastic but we almost didn’t stay there because as pretty as it was – it was located underneath 2 major bridges carrying freeways. We almost didn’t stay…. but we are glad we changed our mind. After all, we got used to falling asleep to police and fire sirens in New York – what could be noisier?
We ended up staying a couple of nights after all. We left our ‘home’ behind and went to check out the intriguing town of Gruene.
And WOW! What a fabulous little town this was. Here comes Texas: music, dancing, cowboys and all!
We fell in love with this beautiful Town straight away!
And to top it all we met some new wonderful friends: Brent and Mindy and their family. And while we played ball in the beer garden our parents were ‘yapping away’.
Brent highly recommended that we stay longer in the area as there is so much to see. He asked us if we had a look at the river yet and was surprised that we hadn’t checked it out considering our RV park was right on it (hence the two bridges).
He also suggested that we go kayaking – and sure enough, he turned up the next day with 2 kayaks and drove us up the river to experience this beautiful waterway. That was so nice of him!
We have never kayaked with our parents before – daddy is not a big fan of exercise and mummy is a fast engine junkie but this experience has certainly changed the way we think – it was just brilliant! Peaceful and truly enjoyable!
And the RV park and the bridges under which the park was located was just breathtaking. It certainly made up for any noise….
So on Monday we went for a drive down the river and found a wonderful campground right on the water’s edge. What an amazing spot!
It had some incredibly beautiful ducks walking around, which once they realized we had pockets full of yummies, became our new best friends…
While driving around we’ve noticed that our local pub was running a charity concert at night with a famous local singer (Wade Bowen) raising funds and collecting toys for kids. Needless to say, this is where we spent a fabulous night.
The concert was great but what was even more fun was meeting our new friends who had three kids with them (Kayla 12, Parker 11 and Charlie 8). Not only did we have great time ‘running a muck’ with them (the pub was huge and had a great, enclosed outdoor section) but they had invited us over to their place after the concert.
Just before we left a local cowboy taught us how to play this cool game: throwing a line with a circle on it and getting it on a hook. It was such a fun game and he was such a patient teacher. We loved it!
We ended up going to our new friend’s place after 10pm at night. They have just moved here from Houston and so their children were not starting school for another 2 weeks. So rock on! We played till 2 o’clock in the morning, dressing up and watching cool movies. It was totally ace!
Tuesday, 19th of December.
Today we spent whole day fishing. Well, maybe not whole day because daddy spent half a day jumping hoops to get a fishing license but once we got hold of it, oh man - we fished!
It was so much fun! We didn’t catch a lot, just a few gold fish size swimmers but it was fun.
In the evening our new friend Brent and his nephew Hunter invited us over back to Gruene to a concert. A band called ‘Two Tons of Steel’ played (Americana style – cross between country and rock) and they were absolutely AWESOME! Man, did we have fun! Here is a link to one of their u tube performances, they were just brilliant!
We danced so much. We danced with our mummy and daddy, we danced with Brent and we danced with this stunning, wealthy looking lady who, even though was 65 years old, had moves of a 20-year dancer. We all climbed up and danced on the benches of course – where else!
While talking to Brent mummy said that what she really wanted to see when coming to Texas was the Longhorn Cows, cowboys and this kind of music. He said that there is another town not far from here called Bandera, which calls itself the ‘Cowboy Capital of the World’. Guess where we were heading the next day?
After arriving in Bandera around lunchtime (we came for a day trip leaving our caravan/trailer behind) we knew straight away that this was ‘our type of place’. Restaurants with saddles at the bar, laid back/ friendly attitude of the locals cowboys and cowgirls walking around– oh yeah, this is paradise – yeeha!
We went into the information center and the lady told us that every Wednesday night is a ‘cook-up’ night at the near by pub. Everybody brings their own meat and throws it on these massive BBQs and then they dance to country music till late at night. She told us that kids are welcome to come.
Well, we had to stay for that!
We also found out that we can stay on a ‘Dude Ranch’ overnight (in a cabin) and go horse riding in the morning. That had really made our day! All girls in this family miss our horses back home so this was not an opportunity to be missed.
We arrived at the ranch after lunch and met some fantastic people. The last week before Christmas is like the ‘Quite before the Storm’ so there was only us staying at the cabins. However we did find out that this ranch also has an RV park where people can bring their own horses. Wow!
We went to explore the ranch and met a cowboy named Justin and his wife Jennifer who look after the property. They were so nice. And they have an Australian dog called Jake who is just adorable. Justin took us for a ride in his 'Gater' ....
And to top it all off they have the sweetest donkey you have ever met called Gov (short for Governor). We played with them for a few hours.
They have a really cool club house on the ranch where we played Ping-Pong and Billiards with our parents as it started to rain.
In the evening we armed ourselves with sausages on sticks (fancy that) and went to the pub. The pub was fantastic! The band was great and we made a lot of friends. We even met these really cute cowboys who were exactly our age and knew how to dance! Yeeha!
While we danced, our parents got invited into a celebration of somebody’s birthday and were having a jolly good time.
They then came across an Australian couple who have been travelling for the last 5 months. Judy and Peter are from Sydney. Mummy and Daddy talked with them for the rest of the night and ended up inviting them back to our camp for Christmas. They figured since all of us are kind-of homeless right now (and missing our families) we might as well spend Christmas with someone who is ‘in the same boat’
We started the morning with a trail horse ride. It was so much fun! We went with cowboy Justin, mummy, us and another gentleman for a whole hour. This is the first time we were allowed to go riding on big horses and we felt like real cowgirls and loved it!
In fact we loved it so much that we decided to come back to the town straight after Christmas. It just happens that the manager - Victoria, who obviously really liked us- made an extra spot for us in their RV park (next to Jenny and cowboy Justin). They have even planned a party for us on Monday night (when we get back) as Ms Victoria is going away on her vacation the next day. Can’t wait!
This is the place where we stayed this time (as we left our ‘home’ behind). A rustic cottage, which was extremely cozy inside.
In the afternoon we went back to the river RV park where we left our caravan/trailer. We fished for the rest of the day and then we went for dinner to Brent and Mindy’s place (who we met the other day). They were so awesome – Brent cooked us the most amazing steak we’ve had for ages. Yum! As we watched television and fell asleep on couches our parents talked and talked and talked. We didn’t get back till 2am in the morning…
The next day we decorated our home with home made Christmas decorations. DOn't you think they looked fabulous?
The next day we decorated our home with home made Christmas decorations. DOn't you think they looked fabulous?
In the afternoon our Aussie Friends arrived and we made some plans on how we should celebrate Christmas together. Jordi and Peter had a bit of Jamming session going on as well.
We ended up having a fabulous Christmas! First, Santa Clause found us all the way here and delivered some fantastic presents. Oh, we are so spoilt!
Even our New York'n dolls got new outfits!
At lunch time our Australian friends, Judy and Peter came over for lunch and we spent a whole day eating, drinking and having a jolly good time! This was probably the first day on this trip, which we had spent indoors and it was great (mind you, it did rain outside). The party finished at 2am in the morning (we were fast asleep by then).
In the morning after saying goodbye to Judy and Peter (they were travelling in a different direction) we went to say goodbye to our neighbors who we met during our stay here.
This ‘goodbye’ exercise took us exactly…5 hrs! Nobody wanted to let us go.
First we hang out with B.J. who lives in the $1mln coach down the road (well, he only comes here for the weekends from Houston). He has given us a tour of his bus; ‘Holy Guacamole’ – we say! This is a total Rock Star fit out and all. B.J., who is a stockbroker by trade, is a musician by nature and very often has famous musicians come and join him for weekends. Had we not been going out every night we probably would have witness some ‘Jamming’ sessions they had.
We were almost ready to say goodbye to BJ when he decided to show us his ‘Toy Box’ – oh, well we weren’t going ANYWHERE after all, LOL
He had any toy a boy could dream of, a road bike, race-bike, trail bike, quad bike and of course a Harley. Mamma Mia, now THAT is what you call a ‘Toy Box’!!!
B.J. also showed us how to…. shoot a gun! But before y’all have a heart attack – like mummy almost did- let us reassure you – it was NOT a real gun. Just a pretend one. Nevertheless mummy was still happier when we put it away.
We then said goodbye to our Canadian friends who were also so nice to us. Rolly,… and their beautiful dog Lilly.
They have two homes (well three if you count their beautiful coach), one in East Canada and one in Florida. They have invited us to meet them in Canada so they can show us around. Awesome people…..
And just about when we were ready to hop in a car (which was parked on the side of the road, running, ready to go for the last few hours), B.J. rocked up on his Harley. It only took us ‘two seconds’ to change into our Harley gear and wave our parents ‘good-bye’. It was such a thrill!!!
B.J. on return told daddy (with a wink and a glance at us) that he thinks daddy should start investing in some scary looking tattoos and a shot gun. Not sure why he would say that, we don’t think daddy would look that good in tattoos…
We really didn’t want to leave but we have promised our friends on the Dude Range that we will come back and they were waiting for us – we couldn’t let them down.
After only a couple of hours drive we arrived back in Bandera where both managers, Ms. Victoria and her husband Capitan were waiting for us with their arms stretched out! They took us for a ride on golf buggies so that we could meet all RV residents and then Captain started a massive fire at the campground with a ….blow torch! No ‘rubbing sticks’ in Texas, LOL
We cooked some marshmallows, ate S’mors, which Ms. Victoria supplied and met some more guests from the villas and the RV park. This was such a wonderful finish to an absolutely perfect day!
The stay on the farm was fantastic! We stayed there for a whole week riding horses and enjoying a fun country living amongst the cowboys.
Our resident cowboy/wrangler/next-to-neighbor – Justin brought his 3 kids onto the ranch and our fun had increased exponentially! So did our mischief factor!
We rode tractors, we rode buggies, we practiced lasso throwing and we chased each other playing cowboys all day long.
We also rode horses every single day. Both Bella and I got advanced to big horses, which was great. We went over the rivers, over the mountains and through the forest- all on the property of the ranch. We even helped with feeding the horses and mummy helped with saddling them up. It was totally ace!
One day Daddy, Bella and I (Jordi) went over to the Rodeo Ring and watched cowboy Justin and his daughter – Charolette- teach mummy how to ‘race the barrels’. Man, they were riding so fast! There were these barrels spaced out and they had to run around them as fast as possible. The person with the lowest time won. Mummy didn’t win, but she sure was pretty fast and we were so proud of her for not falling off this fast beast, LOL
One evening all the girls decided to have a ‘slumber’ party. We got into one of the motel rooms and had a heck of a night; make up, hair rollers, dress-ups and all – even Jordi got converted into a girl for the night! Haha!
The next day mummy decided to do a 'photo shoot' of all us rascals. Here are a few for the album:
The next day mummy decided to do a 'photo shoot' of all us rascals. Here are a few for the album:
Wednesday night, we went to the Wednesday ‘Steak Night’ at the 11th street pub where the adults can cook up their own steaks and dance to some awesome country music. We met some new kids of course and Bella (surprise, surprise) has found another little cowboy to dance with.
His name is Tye and his dad took our email address and asked if the kids could correspond. He sent us this little video clip of them dancing. Isn’t that cute?
They have also invited us to visit them in Houston, which we might do as we will be heading that way early in January.
On Friday we went to visit Lin, the ‘Buffalo Man’. The managers (before they left on their vacation) gave him a call and told him that their Australian friends would like to meet his buffalo. Well, we didn’t just meet his buffalo – we met all sorts of animals he had on his ranch!
We met Buddy, the Asian Water Buffalo who was so placid he just let us sit on his fat tummy while he rested. He was just adorable!
Then we met Lin’s dangerous African ostrich, which amused us with his funny war-dance
Then we met the buffalo – a 3-year-old bison actually – called Lacota. He was sooooo sweet!
He chomped on little snacks we brought him and then gave Lyn a sloppy kiss goodbye. Apparently Lyn had been on the show ‘wife swap’ where he was the ‘husband with a bison living in his house’. We haven’t seen the show but it would’ve been hilarious!
He chomped on little snacks we brought him and then gave Lyn a sloppy kiss goodbye. Apparently Lyn had been on the show ‘wife swap’ where he was the ‘husband with a bison living in his house’. We haven’t seen the show but it would’ve been hilarious!
We then met three handsome boys: Aladdin, Abu and Curly. They were so placid and friendly – gave us all lots of kisses. Apparently these animals on the ranch are very often used in films.
We met a lot of other animals but the abovementioned ones were the most memorable.
On a way out we saw some incredible longhorn bulls (what Texas is so known for)
And then we spotted some African bulls with even bigger horns. It must be true what they say about this area – everything is BIGGER in Texas!
On New Years Eve the town’s historical society had organized a ‘Shootem Up’ theatre to show people what it was like here in the 1800. We sat on the side of the road with our ears plugged tight as the actors performed a scene with lots of shooting – western style.
It was fun to watch although it was extremely loud. Till this day people in America have very lose gun laws, especially here in Texas. A lot of homes have signs on the gates (next to a pretend gun) that says: We do not call 911. Better not knock on these doors!
Woohooo 2012 – here we come!!!
We celebrated New Year with some friends we met at our RV park. A lot of people who stay here, stay for a few weeks or sometimes even months. They call themselves snow-birds as they escape cold winters in the north. A lot of them come in massive trailers and they bring their own horses. It is so cool!
So we celebrated New Year with our new personal friends by the fire cowboy Justin prepared. And that is not all he had prepared – he cooked up a fiesta for everybody – smoked rack of ribs – yummmo! Not only is he the best cowboy we have ever met, but he sure cooks like a pro!
Over the fire we had a lot of fun, especially when daddy brought out his didgeridoo out and people took turns in trying to play it. It was so much fun. The giggles even got higher when daddy was trying to speak in a Texan accent and then teaching everybody how to say ‘G’day’. And by the time he explained to people different ways the word ‘mate’ can be used, he had people crying from laughter. It was such a fun night!
Daddy put the radio on in his car so we could all listen to some nice country (honky- tonk) music. It was a wild party until five minutes before midnight when daddy’s car…. died – and so did the music! Desperate to see the new year we all ran into Justin and Jenny’s trailer and watch ‘the ball drop’ on their TV at midnight for the New Year! Woohoo! 2012 – here we come!
The next morning (the 1st of January) we drove over to a local state park where they were running Cowgirl Showmanship. Lots of girls (young and old) on their Quarter Horses performed all sorts of displays.
There were even Mexican ladies in their beautiful dresses riding horses on side saddles - lady style – with both legs to the side. They were state champions and their ‘dance’ was phenomenal!
There was even a 5 year-old girl who followed her mummy and making her big horse dance. We went over to meet them afterwards and got privileged to hop on those beautiful horses with them. It was such a treat!
In the afternoon the residents of the RV Park got together for lunch and some of the ladies prepared another celebration – oh such yummy foods. We discovered that ‘Black Eye Peas’ is actually a delicious dish and not just a rock band. Apparently it brings people good luck. We ate a lot of that!
We also scuffed down any dishes made out of cabbage as apparently this dish ‘brings you money’. Not sure how that works but hey, we’ll try anything, right? If it brings wealth, who are we to argue? Cabbage or not - Bring it on!
Our new friend Dianne came with us and our parents to town in the afternoon as one of the ladies from the RV park works in the General Store and serves ice cream and promised to make us the best ice-cream we’ve ever had.
The ice cream was delicious but what was funny was finding out that people around town already know about us – those people from Austria, of course. Austria, Australia……ah, what’s a couple of letters between friends, LOL
The owner of the general store also amused us with some incredible stories of a ghost called Henry who lives in the shop. She told us some incredible stories about flying objects, bells ringing, music playing, voices behind her and rearranged postcards every single day. As interesting story as it was, it made us walk out that door faster than we came in….
On the second day of January we decided to do a day trip to San Antonio, a city, which we were going to two weeks ago - but never made it. Everybody was telling us about this ‘River Walk’ and so we had to see it ourselves. And wow, how beautiful it was!
Years ago, the city’s river got flooded damaging a lot of businesses around the area so the engineers designed a large water loop which controls the levels of the river. They built a channel, which is only 3ft deep (just under a metre) and has hundreds of lovely cafes and restaurants around it with lots and lots of bridges connecting both sides. To top it all, the city had just spent $800K on 1.8mil lights to decorate the whole River Walk and it is just spectacular!
We even got on a boat to cruise to truly admire the decorations and the spectacular architecture. We felt like we were in Venice (well, from what mummy told us).
4th of January 2012
Today was one of saddest days of our trip – we had to say goodbye to our new friends in Bandera. Yesterday Capt’n Kury and Miss Victoria (the managers) got back from their vacation and spent most of their afternoon and night with us sitting by the fire and having a jolly good time.
We even went to have breakfast with them this morning and just didn’t want to leave – they have become such good friends! The most fun, friendly, warm and beautiful people we have come across! No wonder they are so good at what they do – they sure know how to make people feel special! People come here as strangers and leave as closest friends!
There are lots of other people on the ranch who are referred to as Winter Texans (as they come here for the winter) who were very sad to see us go. No one shakes hands in Bandera – everyone gives you big, amazing, bear hugs.
As our visa is just about to expire (the first 6 months) we need to leave the country for a little while. We’ve been thinking about going to Central America somewhere. As we were saying goodbye to one of our neighbors – John, he showed us a cool place to go to in Dominican Republic (he was involved in opening a big Casino down there). We said to him ‘why don’t you come with us there – you could show us around?’ And he said ‘why not?’ – oh, this is so funny how life just puts you on different paths when you just open yourself to possibilities. Guess where we will be heading shortly???
On the way out of Bandera we stopped to say G’day to Bandera’s legend Dusty Britches who is not only a brilliant singer (he gave us his signed CD) but he is also an owner of a very tame longhorn steer! It is so tame that it can be saddled up…. and ridden! Yeeha!!!
Even Daddy had a go at mounting ‘the beast’ although they had both decided not to go for a walk together….
Our next stop was at Fredericksbrg, a German town where we had a lovely German d’lunch (such late lunch it was almost a dinner).
Then off we went to famous Luckenbach.
In the evening we arrived at Luckenbach, a town with a population of 3. It is a ‘town’ with a famous pub featured in a Willie Nelson song. At the pub, which attracts talent from all over the country, musicians get together there and just jam.
We arrived pretty late (around 8:30pm) and their session was supposed to finish in half an hour. Well, not when we arrived, they didn’t. Once we got our cowgirl boots on and cowgirl hats on, we were greeted by them with such an enthusiasm that all the musicians agreed to play for another hour and a half!
Two of these musicians were somehow famous (mind you, we had no clue who they were) and they sure sang awesomely!
This is Brigette London – she gave us her CD with dedication
And this is Jake …..
We stayed the night at the pubs' massive car-park (they obviously run big concerts here occasionally) and returned in the morning to listen to some more jamming – this time Jimmy Lee Jones who introduced us to the new version of the song ‘Rudolph, the red nose…… cowboy’! It was very funny.
We did a bit of dancing and then we hit the road towards Houston (which is 5hrs east from here). As we looked on the map, we realized that we will be driving straight through Austin again so we decided to ring our Austin friends; Miriam, Marc and Asa and catch up with them for the afternoon. It was so great seeing them again!
After dinner, our parents dressed us in pajamas and off we went driving at night to Houston, Texas.
We arrived in Houston at 11:30pm and since it was too late to check in to an RV park, we spent the night at a massive car park belonging to Walmart and other superstores.
In the morning we checked into an RV park and spent the day walking around the lake they had on their property and catching up on our homework. Daddy also popped in to a local hairdresser and got his haircut. He probably didn’t like us calling him Elvis anymore…
Mummy also attended to our hair with super heavy duty scissors and an apron made out of rubbish/trash bag, LOL
During the day we also went to a drive-through zoo. It was really funny how daddy washed the windows so carefully so that mummy could take some pictures of animals from the car. Those clean windows lasted about 3 minutes in total.
After paying for our tickets at the entry and purchasing a bucket of feed we were greeted by an ostritch, which decided to block the road and peck on the windows until we fed it.
We then were surrounded by these massive ??? Which slobbered all over freshly cleaned windows. Daddy was devastated his hard work was ‘gone out the door’, mummy screamed when she started getting munched on by one of those creatures and we? We were…...just in heaven!
Once we parked our car, we hopped on the trolley which took us all around the park. We met all sorts of groovy animals and hand-fed most.
They were all types of deer
Lamas
Bison and other buffalo
Even a two-hump camel
After the ride, we went to the petting zoo where we met the most gorgeous goats with little babies. We tried to persuade mummy and daddy to take one kid home – Jordi even volunteered to sleep with it but our parents were pretty adamant we couldn’t buy one. Pity, they were so cute!
We met some nice people at the RV park, Lisa and Les who joined us for a lovely dinner at Mexican restaurant.
When we got back there was something strange happening to our ’home’ – the whole inside smelled of gas/propane. Turns out somebody must’ve accidentally turned on the stove burner. Oh, boy! Daddy quickly evacuated us from there and we spent a few hours outside taking photos of the full moon while daddy ventilated the place. Lucky it was a lovely, warm night and the moon was quite incredible!
The next day, after spending some more time on schoolwork, we caught up with our friends who we met at Bandera (remember the boy dancing with Bella?). Tye and his parents, Gerald and Shelly had invited us to this cool Texan restaurant called Texas Steakhouse. It was really groovy although the first thing we noticed was that there were lots and lots of peanut shells on the floor. Apparently all customers got a bucket of peanuts on their table and no one bothered to use the plates to dispose of the shells…they just threw it on the floor!
After we munched up delicious dinner, we did what any decent child would do – we borrowed three brooms from the kitchen and proceeded to clean up the mess on the floor. The waiters and waitresses were so bemused they all gathered around to watched the wonderful work Tye and us were performing. They were so impressed they even paid us a tip at the end: we got a $1 each. Yeeha!
It was awesome catching up with Tye and his parents. As Tye had to go to school the next day, we couldn’t stay too long but we had been invited over to their home for dinner on Wednesday night.
On Monday morning we woke up to a very rainy day and so we decided to spend a day in an indoor Children’s Museum, which was located half an hour from where we were parked. As we were driving to town we realized that the traffic back was getting extremely busy as people straggled through the rain. Suddenly we saw a river on the side with….cars floating. Oh, no what happened to it? As we watched the car move with the current we realized – this wasn’t a river…this was a highway! Oh, boy!
The further we drove the more floating cars we saw. What do we do? We couldn’t exactly turn around, as this is where most of the floods were congregating. We crossed our fingers and decided to find shelter at the museum and hope that by the time we get out most of the floods will, well…flood away!
We finally got to the Children’s Museum and parked right in front of the sign which said “Children’s Museum Closed Today”. Mummy turned to daddy and said in a crackly voice “Houston….. we’ve got a problem!”
Needless to say the half an hour journey into town turned into 4 hr drive back. We did however gained new appreciation for our GPS lady. She found her 6th sense and navigated us away from all drowning highways avoiding majority of the traffic as well.
We ended up going to the movies instead and we watched Alvin and the Chipmunks (Chipwrecked). It was pretty cool!
The next day (on Tuesday, 10th of January) the rain seemed to ease up a bit and so we decided to venture off to NASA, which was also about half an hour drive from us.
Part of the NASA tour was done on a trolley where they drove us around showing us different places where astronauts train. As luck would have it, they sat us right across a wonderful family from Canada who quickly became our friends. Funny, they have been travelling for the last 6 months (just like us) but on the totally opposite side of States (the east Coast). And here we are meeting them in Texas. What a great opportunity to ‘compare notes’.
NASA was very interesting. They showed us the astronaut training facilities and a building where they used to control all the space shuttles from the ground. Well, back then they weren’t controlling them as much as they were just watching them: the many monitors in the room did not have keyboards. There were two massive computers located two levels below this room we were in. The floor in between was used for cabling. They told us that the cables were about the length of the circumference of the whole world multiplied by three! Oh, that sure sounded long! How on earth did they fit it all into one floor of the building? And how long would it take them to find a short-circuit?
We saw some massive rocket ships which were just ginormous! It took us about 20 minutes to walk around it. And out of all this steel, right at the end ware the astronauts’ quarters – everything else was just a massive fuel tank. Wow!
Our new friends from Canada: Trent, Jo-Ann and 9 y.o. Jayden followed us back to our RV park to spent a couple of days together.
The next day all of us (including our new Canadian friends) ventured off to Kemah Boardwalk, a really nice part of Houston, which had a built-in amusement park. And guess what is the best part of travelling offseason – yep, you guessed it - It was ALL for us!
We spent a whole day there having fun but mostly watching Bella going on the creasiest rides that even I and Jayden opted to watch from a distance. She sure is a crazy chick!
We spent the late afternoon back at camp socializing. We had so much fun with our new friends: while our parents spent the rest of the day chatting and drinking wine; we got busy playing Jayden’s Wii. Oh, it was so cool to be able to plug into some type of technology, LOL
We finished playing very late. By the time we ‘rolled out’ of our beds the next day, had our breakfast and did our schoolwork, it was… well afternoon again so with everybody’s agreement we decided to spend the day indoors. It was a rainy day anyway, so it what a better way to spend it than performing musical concerts for our parents!
Now, everybody who knows us would know that we are not shy if it comes to performing arts but our new friend; Jayden helped us to take it to the next level. With his talented singing and dancing, we were in our element – Blues Brothers, here we come!
Jayden also introduced us to the wonderful music of The Beatles (apparently he discovered The Beatles by watching…….Wiggles) and of course we had to do Elvis some justice as well, LOL. The whole night was a total blast!
The next day, we had to say good bye to our new friends as they were heading the opposite direction. Pity we couldn't spend more time together - they were ace! We really hope to catch op with them sometime soon.
Jayden also shared his awesome slideshow of their trip so far - he did a fantastic job and we are looking so forward to seeing the places they have already visited.
The next day, we had to say good bye to our new friends as they were heading the opposite direction. Pity we couldn't spend more time together - they were ace! We really hope to catch op with them sometime soon.
We chilled some more at the RV Park we stayed at called Almost Heaven. Mummy said they didn’t necessary called it that because of its beauty but rather because of the average age of people who stayed there…permanently. Not sure what mummy was about – we thought it was quite pretty. Lots of space to run around, lake with cute ducks and neighbors with fancy cars…
On Wednesday night we went over to our Houston’s friends place for a pizza and some more fun. They were so great!
Gerald (Tye’s dad) showed us his amazing collection of…...guns! What else, we are in Texas, right? Holy guacamole! What a wonderful collection he has. Some even dating back to the early 1800s, which were handed down from his father and grandfather. Even to us rookies, this collection looked pretty special!
At one point daddy took a big gun in his hand and said to us ‘You can call me Rambo from now on’. No idea what that was all about….
Even 7 year old Tye has his own riffle which he proudly showed off.
Gerald invited daddy to go hunting with him when we get back from Central America. With daddy’s Aussie heart, we doubt he’d be able to pull a trigger, but then again….the meat Gerald had shared with us was indeed divine!
We played with Tye and goofed around. It was a blast!
What a wonderful friends they have become!
On our last day in Houston we drove an hour south to Galveston Island where they have three pyramids with lots of wonderful things.
The first one was an aquarium, which had lots of water creatures (yeah, we know that’s obvious). But what we liked best is the wonderful display of penguins. They were oh so adorable!
One even came to give us a kiss!
The second pyramid was a rainforest, where they had a beautiful collection of birds, fish, butterflies and little monkeys. It was very…tropical!
The third pyramid was a discovery center but as the luck would have it…it was closed this week (whilst they were changing over their displays).
After finding out that the cost of flying to Central America is cheaper from Austin than it is from Houston (and it is closer to Bandera where we would like to return to for Rodeos), we decided to pack up and return to Austin.
Austin is a very unique town; very ‘user friendly’ as daddy would call it and has a ‘safe feel’ to it. It’s a bit of an alternative/artistic town with lots of live music, nice food and lots of males with facial hair: you know 70s meets the cave man style?
However safe it feels, one sometimes cannot help to be reminded we are in Texas. Check out the wheels on this car!
We got in contact with our ‘Austinian’ friends and met up with them a few times during our ‘return’.
One day, Asa and his dad, Marc invited us to go Roller Skating in a big skating ring with disco lights on. It was so much fun! Except Bella fell over on her head and grew a bump the size of a watermelon! But tough chick she is… after a bit of ice pack TLC, she got out there and got involved in the racing competition. That’s our girl! Go Bella!
After going roller-skating – if that was not enough fun – we went out to watch the Professional Bull Riders in action. Yeeeeha! Out came the boots, and the checkered shirts and the cowboy hats. Even daddy dressed as a wrangler – mummy thought he looks quite handsome especially when he started saying ‘yes mam’ to her…
The Bull ride was nothing short of exhilarating. 42 cowboys all being ‘rag-dolled’ and then thrown off these massive longhorn beasts – what a spectacle! We got totally right into it, especially as we found out there was an Australian cowboy among them – Aussie, Aussie, Aussie!
He was one of the very few who stayed on the bull past their 8 seconds. He even had time to wave to everybody – that’s an Aussie spirit!
Some of the falls looked very painful especially when the bulls turned around and helped the riders up with their horns. Ouch!
Some of them got even stomped on. Mummy explained to us the definition of ‘temporary citizen’ and said that all these cowboys fall under this definition. Oh, boy!
Lucky there was a cowboy on the ground that helped distract the bull and probably saved a few lives along the way. Pretty brave (or crazy?) for someone who makes $75 a performance!
Mummy says he does it for the love of it – although we are not sure what there is to love. They look pretty mean, those beasts!
Once the rider came off the bull, the bull would be called over to it’s enclosure by a cowboy calling them ‘here, kitty, kitty’. Some listen to him, but those, which didn’t were dealt with by the wrangler who’d catch bring them back ... with a lasso of course.
But sometimes the bull would get his revenge even on the wrangler and his mortified horse.
Even some little kids had a go at riding…….the sheep. Some parents were real proud of their kids holding on for dear life – a noble preparation for the ‘temporary citizen’ apprenticeship.
After the rodeo there was a big party with a rock band playing and we got to honky – tonk a bit which was such a fun way to finish another perfect day!
As the weather was quite lovely in Austin we played in some nice playgrounds or went for walks around the lake/river in town. We even got to do some healthy jogging (well I jogged while Bella hitched a ride with daddy).
During our stay in Austin we caught up with a friend we met in Bandera – Dianne. We had a lovely lunch with her and caught up on the ‘Bandera gossip’ – checking out what all our friends in Bandera were up to – we really miss them!
During the week, we visited a few libraries to polish up our reading. We even got to practice karate…through book instructions of course.
On our last day in Austin we went to an Improvised Theatre, which was just fantastic! A few grown up actors got together and entertained kids for over an hour with great stories in which we even got to participate. 
As we were running a bit late for the show, we got in during the performance without tickets (there was no one at the door) and when we went up to pay after the performance and they found out we were from Australia, guess what they did? They didn’t charge us at all! They said it was their gift to us for coming to visit them in America! How nice was that?!
We stuck around for a little while after the show to have a chat to the actors and they gave us a few pointers on how to become good at acting. They were very helpful.
On the way out, we stopped downstairs at a café (the theatre was upstairs) to buy a couple of drinks. As we were waiting for our parents to pay we noticed a group of people sitting around the tables drawing. Turns out it was a sketch club which of course…we joined!
We met a few good artists; one even let us use his drawing pads and pastels. What a good idea for a club. We must start our own when we return home.
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24th of January 2012
OK, so we decided to do a little ‘last minute’ detour. Daddy’s brother was to arrive in Tucson, Arizona for a gem show the day before we were scheduled to fly out of the country and we couldn’t possibly miss the opportunity to see him, even if he was 1000 miles (1600km) away! What’s 1000 miles in the scheme of things? In two days? No worries! Let’s go!
We drove all day and most of the night all the way to New Mexico’s White Sand National Monument. We couldn't possibly go past it without seeing it. Apparently it is one of the largest sand dunes in the world. Incidentally this is also where US air force does their missile testing and training. It certainly was our intention to make sure we miss anything falling out of the skies!
The long, long drive (about 16 hrs) was nicely rewarded when we woke up to this sensational view!
Wow, this was just fabulous! Of course we started our visit at the Information Centre where we spent our first hour learning about this National Monument through their Junior Ranger Program.
We walked around, read lots of information and answered lots and lots of questions.
And once we were satisfied that we knew all the answers we completed our program with a pledge to always do good by the National Parks.
Now that we received our certificate and a Junior Range Badge, it was time to get rewarded!
Our parents rented us some toboggans, and off we went to have fun!
We ended up spending most of the day on the dunes. Jumping and running and laughing.
Of course mummy was in her element, snapping away like crazy!
We left the Monument in the afternoon and went on another long, long drive…all the way to…. Arizona. By the time we got to Tucson, Arizona it was early the next morning.
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We spent the next day doing a little bit of shopping buying presents for our cousins (so that our uncle could take them home). We couldn’t wait to see our ‘Uncle Dodo’ (Daddy’s brother) whose plane unfortunately got delayed.
And so while we waited we went to chat with some neighbors. The RV park we stayed was super cool – like a real resort and it was full of beautiful coaches.
It just happened that our next-door neighbors were people with the most beautiful dogs – little mini Yorkies (Yorkshire terriers). Needles to say we totally fell in love with them. Do you see a little resemblance between them and us? (same hair color and adorability factor?)
We even got invited over for drinks in the evening and while mummy and daddy talked with the grown ups: Mel, Cheryl and Larry we played with their wonderful dogs, the Yorkies and two adorable Poodles -the awesome foursome. Pity they ha to leave the next day!
We even got invited over for drinks in the evening and while mummy and daddy talked with the grown ups: Mel, Cheryl and Larry we played with their wonderful dogs, the Yorkies and two adorable Poodles -the awesome foursome. Pity they ha to leave the next day!
26th of February 2012, 10pm.
Our uncle DODO has finally landed! Woohoo! Mummy and daddy made us go to bed really early today so that when we get the phone call that the ‘Eagle has landed’ we will be up and gone within minutes. We just couldn’t wait to see him!
The family reunion was very teary! We were so wrapped to see him! And even though Uncle Dodo just spent 35 hrs on the plane (his original flight got cancelled and he had to take a longer flight to get here), he still managed to stay up with us for hours.
We ‘hit the town’ of course for some yummy Mexican followed by monster cookies. Our parents were speechless when we talked our uncle to buy us massive chocolate cookies with hot chocolate to drink at….2am in the morning! But what could they do? They thought, if they can't beat us, why not join us for the feast?
We hung out until all our eye lids started to close (even with the massive sugar intake). But before we left we had to do one more thing…ring our grand parents who was just as thrilled about our reunion as we were!
We got back to uncle Dodo’s hotel room and skyped our family back home. It was so great speaking to everybody!
After struggling to keep our little eyes open, we finally decided that it might be a good idea to go home and get some sleep.
*Please join us in the next chapter: Central America 2012
(by clicking on it at the top of this page)
*Please join us in the next chapter: Central America 2012
(by clicking on it at the top of this page)
Yee Haaa! What a load of Texan fun you had.
ReplyDeleteAlready looking forward to the Dominican Republic update.
Love Juliet, Kurt, Lottie and Pippa