Day 15 - Austin, Tx. to Dallas, Tx.
Today was a sad day. I dropped La Sara off at the airport bright and early this morning. A sad day indeed. But someone around here has to be an adult, and it most certainly isn't me.
After dropping Sara off at the airport I made my way back in to the center of downtown Austin to the State Capital Building. When I arrived I was the first rally MINI there! So I got the lead spot at the front of the pack to come. I was about an hour and a half early for the morning meet up so I walked about 6 blocks to the Starbucks to grab a snack and a decaf and finish up on the blog from yesterday. Today was going to be an easy and short day, so I thought. After my decaf I made my way back to the crowd and mingled and shot a few pictures. When I came back to Tycoon I realized that I was no long first in line, grrr, some of the locals had butted in line. Bummer. I know for sure I'll never be this early again so there went my chance to be first out of the gate! But they sure were showing their Texas spirit, long horns all the way!
The local club members gave us free Texas MINI stickers, so Tycoon is rocking her Texas Union Jack now. I'm really loving that sticker, its a great idea and design.
While mingling and checking out the sites I met up with Ali, one of the Brits who flew over to do the whole trip and is hitchhiking with a different MINI driver everyday. His blog is jcwadventures.com and asked to ride with me today. I said of course! So we loaded his suitcase in the back and got ready to roll.
On a side note. Yesterday there was a bit of drama on the road that we missed. On the route a couple of MINIs were apparently extremely rude and reckless and were passing dangerously and on chip seal roads and in construction zones. They tossed rocks all over a bunch of MINIs, damaging a custom paint job, breaking a few windshields, and hitting cabrio owners in the face with rocks. It was a big hubbub on the web forums yesterday and honestly starting to look like there was going to be a lynch mob this morning. The offending MINI drivers gave a short speech apologizing. I think there was a lukewarm response, but no boos or lynching. I won't go in to detail on my opinion of the matter since I wasn't there, but the stories from yesterday are not pretty.
Ali and I saddled up and prepared to head out with a full police blockade and escort to the highway. Yippie Ki Yay we are on our way. It was a quick drive out to Franklin, Texas to a drive through safari! Oh my gosh, this place was so much fun. As soon as we drove over the cattle guards the animals swarmed Tycoon. I'm sure Tycoon was a bit worried for her paint job, and ruining her brand new hand wash from yesterday, but we were having a blast. Camels, deer, buffalo, a highland cow all sticking their heads in our window looking for some good chow. Prairie dogs yelling at us, a donkey chasing us down the trail, little piglets! So much fun. Thank goodness we were at the front of the pack because the MINIs towards the back had to wait a long time to get in to the park. It was fun and so worth it. I even found a mini horse for the MINI club! Gah, dying of cuteness here.
After the safari park I let Ali take the wheel for a drive. Watch out! Brit on the wrong side of the road! He was actually very respectful of Tycoon and didn't want to do a hair over the speed limit and took very good care of her. When we got to a bit of a twistie road that MINI USA had found for us he put his go pro on to film a little bit of the road. The twisties were hard to resist and he opened her up just a little bit.
Once out of the good stuff we were stuck back on the highway. At one point we were a bit confused by MINI USA's route and ended up going around in a complete loop on I175. All of the sudden it looked like groundhog day and we both looked at each other thinking, weren't we just here? Crud, oh well, I guess we will become NASCAR drivers Ali said. Touche my Brit friend, touche. Back on track we made it to Dallas relatively quickly and dropped of Ali at his hotel. It was a good, fun day with great conversation and a great story to tell! I got to motor with the Brit hitchhiker!
I decided a nap was in order before the evening owners event so I crashed for a good two hours this afternoon. I probably shouldn't have, because I woke up tired and in a funk. Be prepared for a pissy paragraph and stop reading if you don't want pissy Erin. Can I just say, I'm really not liking Dallas. Maybe it's because we have been out in the middle of nowhere and small cities for the past week and me for two weeks. But this city is so jumbled and makes no sense, every road is under construction and shut down with no detour signs to get you back where you need to go. None of the gps systems are updated so they try and take you down closed routes. People drive like bigger aholes than in New Jersey. Sorry, dude, I'm going 80mph and there are 6 lanes of people across the highway in front of me. I CAN'T GO ANYWHERE SO GET OFF MY ASS. I guess we really are headed east.
I made it to Gilly's of Dallas, a famous saloon, for the evening owners event. I was so hungry I needed food asap. So I bee lined for the buffet which looked amazing! I had myself three plates of small food and was ready to chow down. I walked around for 15 minutes trying to find a place to set my plate down and eat, but failed. It was seriously lacking in tables for the number of people there, standing and sitting tables. Every time I tried to stand or sit people were guarding spots like they were the holy grail and Jesus was just over there grabbing a coke. And I just broke. I'm tired, I'm hungry, oh did I say I'm tired? I found a corner of the bar and ate my now cold food over the trash can. Trying to hide my face in the corner as I lost my shit and had a good crying jag going. No idea why I couldn't get myself together, I'm chalking it up to hormones and blaming it on Winnie.
But of course the MINI community always knows how to boost your spirits. After getting some food in my belly, 4guysinaMINI's Sampson started talking to me. This guy is just the best. We had so much fun and such a nice fun chat that he totally pulled me out of my pity party and at least got me past the weepies. So I pulled myself up by the boot straps and walked around and took some photos. The mechanical bull from Urban Cowboy is here! MINI also had an up and coming country singer give us a concert. She was awesome. I'm going to have to figure out what her name was again because she rocked.
As I was taking some photos of her I started talking to a MINI guy I hadn't seen before. He introduced himself and said he was one of the execs for MINI of Dallas. What a small world my friend. I told him I called his dealership 3 days ago. He looked at me and said, "Oh my gosh that was you!?" Guilty as charged, guilty as charged. I told him that despite one of his people not knowing what MINI Takes the States was she was very nice. He said he felt terrible, which he really shouldn't to be fair. But we had a bit of a laugh at the fact that the two of us just started chatting and happened to run in to each other. See, small world MINI.
By this point it was definitely time for me to get out and get some real sleep so I decided to go. And of course got LOST ON CLOSED ROADS IN DALLAS. GRRR. F you construction and Waze, you are being a bitch, go home.
Goodnight.
*Pictures are going to have to wait. I'm exhausted and we have a haul to Memphis tomorrow*
Today was a sad day. I dropped La Sara off at the airport bright and early this morning. A sad day indeed. But someone around here has to be an adult, and it most certainly isn't me.
After dropping Sara off at the airport I made my way back in to the center of downtown Austin to the State Capital Building. When I arrived I was the first rally MINI there! So I got the lead spot at the front of the pack to come. I was about an hour and a half early for the morning meet up so I walked about 6 blocks to the Starbucks to grab a snack and a decaf and finish up on the blog from yesterday. Today was going to be an easy and short day, so I thought. After my decaf I made my way back to the crowd and mingled and shot a few pictures. When I came back to Tycoon I realized that I was no long first in line, grrr, some of the locals had butted in line. Bummer. I know for sure I'll never be this early again so there went my chance to be first out of the gate! But they sure were showing their Texas spirit, long horns all the way!
The local club members gave us free Texas MINI stickers, so Tycoon is rocking her Texas Union Jack now. I'm really loving that sticker, its a great idea and design.
While mingling and checking out the sites I met up with Ali, one of the Brits who flew over to do the whole trip and is hitchhiking with a different MINI driver everyday. His blog is jcwadventures.com and asked to ride with me today. I said of course! So we loaded his suitcase in the back and got ready to roll.
On a side note. Yesterday there was a bit of drama on the road that we missed. On the route a couple of MINIs were apparently extremely rude and reckless and were passing dangerously and on chip seal roads and in construction zones. They tossed rocks all over a bunch of MINIs, damaging a custom paint job, breaking a few windshields, and hitting cabrio owners in the face with rocks. It was a big hubbub on the web forums yesterday and honestly starting to look like there was going to be a lynch mob this morning. The offending MINI drivers gave a short speech apologizing. I think there was a lukewarm response, but no boos or lynching. I won't go in to detail on my opinion of the matter since I wasn't there, but the stories from yesterday are not pretty.
Ali and I saddled up and prepared to head out with a full police blockade and escort to the highway. Yippie Ki Yay we are on our way. It was a quick drive out to Franklin, Texas to a drive through safari! Oh my gosh, this place was so much fun. As soon as we drove over the cattle guards the animals swarmed Tycoon. I'm sure Tycoon was a bit worried for her paint job, and ruining her brand new hand wash from yesterday, but we were having a blast. Camels, deer, buffalo, a highland cow all sticking their heads in our window looking for some good chow. Prairie dogs yelling at us, a donkey chasing us down the trail, little piglets! So much fun. Thank goodness we were at the front of the pack because the MINIs towards the back had to wait a long time to get in to the park. It was fun and so worth it. I even found a mini horse for the MINI club! Gah, dying of cuteness here.
After the safari park I let Ali take the wheel for a drive. Watch out! Brit on the wrong side of the road! He was actually very respectful of Tycoon and didn't want to do a hair over the speed limit and took very good care of her. When we got to a bit of a twistie road that MINI USA had found for us he put his go pro on to film a little bit of the road. The twisties were hard to resist and he opened her up just a little bit.
Once out of the good stuff we were stuck back on the highway. At one point we were a bit confused by MINI USA's route and ended up going around in a complete loop on I175. All of the sudden it looked like groundhog day and we both looked at each other thinking, weren't we just here? Crud, oh well, I guess we will become NASCAR drivers Ali said. Touche my Brit friend, touche. Back on track we made it to Dallas relatively quickly and dropped of Ali at his hotel. It was a good, fun day with great conversation and a great story to tell! I got to motor with the Brit hitchhiker!
I decided a nap was in order before the evening owners event so I crashed for a good two hours this afternoon. I probably shouldn't have, because I woke up tired and in a funk. Be prepared for a pissy paragraph and stop reading if you don't want pissy Erin. Can I just say, I'm really not liking Dallas. Maybe it's because we have been out in the middle of nowhere and small cities for the past week and me for two weeks. But this city is so jumbled and makes no sense, every road is under construction and shut down with no detour signs to get you back where you need to go. None of the gps systems are updated so they try and take you down closed routes. People drive like bigger aholes than in New Jersey. Sorry, dude, I'm going 80mph and there are 6 lanes of people across the highway in front of me. I CAN'T GO ANYWHERE SO GET OFF MY ASS. I guess we really are headed east.
I made it to Gilly's of Dallas, a famous saloon, for the evening owners event. I was so hungry I needed food asap. So I bee lined for the buffet which looked amazing! I had myself three plates of small food and was ready to chow down. I walked around for 15 minutes trying to find a place to set my plate down and eat, but failed. It was seriously lacking in tables for the number of people there, standing and sitting tables. Every time I tried to stand or sit people were guarding spots like they were the holy grail and Jesus was just over there grabbing a coke. And I just broke. I'm tired, I'm hungry, oh did I say I'm tired? I found a corner of the bar and ate my now cold food over the trash can. Trying to hide my face in the corner as I lost my shit and had a good crying jag going. No idea why I couldn't get myself together, I'm chalking it up to hormones and blaming it on Winnie.
But of course the MINI community always knows how to boost your spirits. After getting some food in my belly, 4guysinaMINI's Sampson started talking to me. This guy is just the best. We had so much fun and such a nice fun chat that he totally pulled me out of my pity party and at least got me past the weepies. So I pulled myself up by the boot straps and walked around and took some photos. The mechanical bull from Urban Cowboy is here! MINI also had an up and coming country singer give us a concert. She was awesome. I'm going to have to figure out what her name was again because she rocked.
As I was taking some photos of her I started talking to a MINI guy I hadn't seen before. He introduced himself and said he was one of the execs for MINI of Dallas. What a small world my friend. I told him I called his dealership 3 days ago. He looked at me and said, "Oh my gosh that was you!?" Guilty as charged, guilty as charged. I told him that despite one of his people not knowing what MINI Takes the States was she was very nice. He said he felt terrible, which he really shouldn't to be fair. But we had a bit of a laugh at the fact that the two of us just started chatting and happened to run in to each other. See, small world MINI.
By this point it was definitely time for me to get out and get some real sleep so I decided to go. And of course got LOST ON CLOSED ROADS IN DALLAS. GRRR. F you construction and Waze, you are being a bitch, go home.
Goodnight.
*Pictures are going to have to wait. I'm exhausted and we have a haul to Memphis tomorrow*
Sounds likes a tough day.. I hope you got a good night sleep. Look forward to the newer posts, I'm still here reading faithfully. :)
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