Day 14 - August 1, 2014 - Lubbock, Tx. to Austin Tx.
No RAIN! Sara and I made it through the night with no rain. We didn't break out the tarp and slept with the tent flaps open. It was glorious, beautiful, and nice and cool. We were up before the sun today because we wanted to get a jump on the run and get to Austin as soon as we could to get Tycoon's oil changed. Somehow even though we woke up at the same time we have almost every day the sun hadn't started to come up yet today. We ended up breaking camp in the dark.
The morning event was held in the parking lot of the civic center in Lubbock. Rather than get in line for the rally we parked off to the side in order to escape as soon as we grabbed some breakfast. We saw a MINI we hadn't seen yet, a great countryman with a Canadian theme and a plate that said "MINI Eh". Love it. Since today was Sara's last day on the road she stocked up on some MINI swag while I grabbed us some burritos and we prepared to head out.
We didn't follow MINI USA's route for today because we wanted to get to Austin as soon as possible. So we just wazed the route and beat feet out of town. It was a rather boring drive, it looks a lot like Ohio I think. We caught up to Bill in the Stuck on MINIs RV about an hour in to the trip, waved and got a great big rig beep from him.
Most of the day we were on two lane roads with speed limits of 75mph. My kind of back roads. I had the cruise set at 80 which means I'm really doing 77. Police don't even blink at you. I felt like I was getting away with something the whole time. You never get to go that fast on roads like this back east. There were a ton of wind farms along the way. I was actually shocked at how many there were. I have never seen so many outside of California. I always thought Texas was oil wells as far as the eye could see, but today, it is windmills.
We stopped for gas and a potty break in a small town outside of Coleman I think it was. After filling up I went in to the store. To say this was some Texas chainsaw massacre type place is being nice. In the bathroom someone had carved "RUN" into the sink. Ummmm, yeahhhhh. I also had to disassemble the back of the toilet to get it to semi flush. I hate being courteous sometimes because really all I wanted to do was take that advice and run as fast as I could from this place.
On our way again, Sara had picked up a bag of something called cracklins? I had never heard of such a thing. I didn't think I wanted to try these things. I knew that they were something along the lines of pork rinds, but I'm from the North yo. We don't do that stuff. But you have to try new things. So I tried. They weren't terrible, kind of like crunchy popcorn with hot spices on them.
We arrived at MINI of Austin and were helped immediately by the Service Manager who got us right in for an oil change. What a great MINI dealership! Everyone was extremely helpful, even in the midst of being inundated with MINIs. We were in and out in an hour and a half and they even HAND WASHED Tycoon! Now you want to talk about service, that is some service.
Sara and I were still early for the party so we checked in to the hotel near the airport for the night. Sara is flying out super early so she booked us a hotel right next door. I immediately laid down and took a power nap while Sara freshened up. We then decided we needed some food since we hadn't really eaten all day. When in Texas, you must eat BBQ. This place was amazing. The ribs fell off the bone and the sides were delish. We pigged out and sat on their patio and came to the conclusion that Winnie is for certain a carnivore. We sat there and watched her completely freak out through my shirt. I guess she likes BBQ.
Our relatively quiet day ended with an epic party in Austin hosted by MINI of Austin. Complete with a rocking band, armadillos, and pictures with long horned cattle! Everywhere you turned there was something totally Texas and totally awesome. The armadillos were so adorable! They were rescued from places where they otherwise would have been killed or died due to injury. So these were all ones that were about to be released back to the wild. The one I'm holding was about to fall asleep in my hands, and then he peed on me a little bit. I guess he was just trying to prepare me for Winnie. Our Buzzfeed guys caught up with us and interviewed Sara before we departed and we took one last photo with the 4 of us together.
Here is where things get interesting. We wanted to find some souvenirs from Austin, magnets, teeshirts, etc. Around me took us about 3 miles away in to downtown Austin and in to quite the sketchy area of town. We easily found a spot to park about two blocks from the shop, on a corner with what appeared to be local characters hanging out under a sign that said, No open alcoholic containers, no sitting or sleeping on the sidewalk, no solicitation, no... you get the idea. The police had someone sitting on the curb up the street and the paddy wagon was at the other end just waiting for customers. As Sara went to get a ticket to park one of the officers came up to her and said, "Are you going in to downtown, I wouldn't recommend leaving your car there for an extended amount of time". So we practically ran to the shop, selected our wares, and high tailed it back to Tycoon who was receiving a certain amount of interest.
And that ends our night. Not as exciting a day as usual, but don't worry, I'm sure we will have plenty to come in the next 8 days. Off to sleep in a king sized bed tonight!
Goodnight.
No RAIN! Sara and I made it through the night with no rain. We didn't break out the tarp and slept with the tent flaps open. It was glorious, beautiful, and nice and cool. We were up before the sun today because we wanted to get a jump on the run and get to Austin as soon as we could to get Tycoon's oil changed. Somehow even though we woke up at the same time we have almost every day the sun hadn't started to come up yet today. We ended up breaking camp in the dark.
The morning event was held in the parking lot of the civic center in Lubbock. Rather than get in line for the rally we parked off to the side in order to escape as soon as we grabbed some breakfast. We saw a MINI we hadn't seen yet, a great countryman with a Canadian theme and a plate that said "MINI Eh". Love it. Since today was Sara's last day on the road she stocked up on some MINI swag while I grabbed us some burritos and we prepared to head out.
That Texas sun is BRIGHT!
Shined and clean after her hand wash pampering.
Our relatively quiet day ended with an epic party in Austin hosted by MINI of Austin. Complete with a rocking band, armadillos, and pictures with long horned cattle! Everywhere you turned there was something totally Texas and totally awesome. The armadillos were so adorable! They were rescued from places where they otherwise would have been killed or died due to injury. So these were all ones that were about to be released back to the wild. The one I'm holding was about to fall asleep in my hands, and then he peed on me a little bit. I guess he was just trying to prepare me for Winnie. Our Buzzfeed guys caught up with us and interviewed Sara before we departed and we took one last photo with the 4 of us together.
Here is where things get interesting. We wanted to find some souvenirs from Austin, magnets, teeshirts, etc. Around me took us about 3 miles away in to downtown Austin and in to quite the sketchy area of town. We easily found a spot to park about two blocks from the shop, on a corner with what appeared to be local characters hanging out under a sign that said, No open alcoholic containers, no sitting or sleeping on the sidewalk, no solicitation, no... you get the idea. The police had someone sitting on the curb up the street and the paddy wagon was at the other end just waiting for customers. As Sara went to get a ticket to park one of the officers came up to her and said, "Are you going in to downtown, I wouldn't recommend leaving your car there for an extended amount of time". So we practically ran to the shop, selected our wares, and high tailed it back to Tycoon who was receiving a certain amount of interest.
And that ends our night. Not as exciting a day as usual, but don't worry, I'm sure we will have plenty to come in the next 8 days. Off to sleep in a king sized bed tonight!
Goodnight.
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