Monday, September 28, 2009

Texas! Part 2



We spent the next day with the fam, and I was really glad to. I like Indiana and all, but my family (extended and otherwise) is awesome, and having them live so many states away (and in other states as well) really stinks.

Jason has some things in common with my Uncle, and I'd never even thought of it before.

We visited Papa's house an got a nice tour of his studio. I don't know why he won't smile.

Papa said there was an armadillo living in one of his bushes.

I looked at about 10 different pictures of all of us together, and there's not even on where we're all smiling, or even looking at the camera.

The next day we were on our way to Palo Duro canyon. We stopped at one of the nicest rest stops ever, with the most frightening signs, EVERYWHERE.

We drove all day again, and saw an actual cattle drive. We also saw about a million wind farms. It was a long, fast drive. Mom had a great theory. The reason the speed limit is so high in Texas is that if you're going to get anywhere in a reasonable amount of time, you'd better go fast.

W arrived in Canyon that night and were duly impressed. It was really amazing, the 2nd biggest canyon in the US. We stopped for pictures, then made our way down to have some dinner, and see a show.

The show was Texas, and it had been performed for 40 years at the stage in the canyon. You'd think that in that time, they could have made it awesome. Instead it was rather amateurish. My eyes didn't bleed, but it wasn't awesome either.

The real show was above us. Both in the amphitheater and on our way back to the hotel, I coudn't keep my eyes off the stars. It was truly amazing. If I've not said it before, I'll say it again, the sky really is bigger in Texas.

The next morning we took a jeep tour. The owners thought we were brave since, for them, they'd had a lot of rain the night before. To us, it was nothing, a few inches, and I remember 2 years ago 12 inches in12 hours, but they promised that if anything looked unsafe to pass, we would turn back.

The tour was really great. The guide was informative, and entertaining. The ranch he works for owns half of the canyon, and they use it. It's a working cattle ranch, even thought we only saw one cow. He looked kinda lonely. We got to get out of the jeep and walk around a little on interesting rock formations. There were lots of cacti. We saw a roadrunner, but failed to get an actual picture, he ran off. We looked over the edge. Jason wanted me to stay in the jeep.







After the tour we hiked just a little bit. Jason and I would really like to go back and camp overnight in the canyon. We saw deer, and more cacti. We drove back out of the canyon, and then we were headed home, but the long way. On the way to Indiana we stopped at a cheese place in Missouri that apparently no longer exists (we keep finding disconnected numbers) and we saw a tumbleweed. Jason says that it was just a weed, since it was stuck on a fence. :P