U.S.A - Texas

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David here...

We left Mexico and arrived into the Texan heat at Houston with no problems. We picked up our hire car (a Nissan Versa) and drove to the La Quinta Inn just off the highway and checked into a room that included air-con, a fridge, cable TV, a huge King size bed and a reclining chair (which Suzanne quickly baggsied). This was luxury and we immediately felt at home. After freshening up we headed out to the local Walmart and bought some camping gear in readiness for our road trip through 5 states, though it would not be until we hit New Mexico that we could start camping as the heat in Texas was just too much, at over 100 deg. during the day and it not cooling down much at night. We stopped off for pizza on the way back to the hotel and then relaxed in our lovely room with beer and wine.

The next morning we got the bus to Downtown and then caught the metro to the museum district where we went to the Holocaust museum, which was very interesting. We then went back to Downtown and had some lunch at a grill before finding our way to the wonderful Flying Saucer bar, which had tons and tons of craft beers on tap. We only went in for one but ended up having 4 before catching a bus back to our hotel, where we relaxed again with a bottle of wine.

We decided to stay another night in Houston as we wanted to go to the NASA visitors centre, which was well worth the drive out to. The highlight being the tram tour where we saw the rocket park and the original Apollo mission control. It was also interesting to see that they didn't sweep over the disasters that have happened in the journey of space exploration. They showed video footage of the Challenger explosion and the reaction in mission control, which was just stunned silence. I remember seeing the news and footage in 1986 of the explosion and no matter how many times you see it it is always a shock, but to be able to also see the reaction in mission control and the helplessness of the people on the ground, it really was quite sobering. Along one wall there was a picture of every crew that has gone into space, including the 3 crews that died (Apollo 1 in 1967,Challenger in 1986 and Columbia in 2003). The pictures of these 3 crews had a small black line on the bottom corner, a subtle and quite moving tribute to them.

After leaving the NASA centre we did more shopping before having dinner and finally relaxing in the room again (the buses stopped running really early and a taxi was a bit pricey). We really made the most of that room.

Our next stop on our road trip was San Antonio where we tried 3 La Quintas before finding one where the price was reasonable to us. The room was nice enough, with the same facilities as the last one, but being a little out of town, was just a little run-down. We arrived quite late so went straight out to the recommended Longhorn Steakhouse and had a beautiful meal before heading back to the hotel. The next day we caught 2 buses into Downtown where we wandered round the Alamo before succumbing to the heat and having an ice cream and then heading back to our hotel area where we went to the cinema (Cowboys and Aliens) and had dinner at a little Mexican restaurant.

Our next destination was Austin where we stayed in a Super 8 hotel, which was the nicest room yet, with a DVD player and microwave included. We were enjoying these rooms however it was eating into our budget faster than we liked. We managed to catch a bus into the centre of Austin (the hotel staff had never been asked about buses before) - even though this involved walking by a freeway and crossing and unbridged river! We first went to Casio El Camino for a tasty burger and fries before heading to a Metal and Viking bar called Valhalla...or so we had read. When we got there, we found a normal bar that had a few classic metal albums on the jukebox but nothing at all to do with Vikings. The bar was nice enough though so we stayed for a bit before moving onto Headhunters where we caught a live band who were pretty good, didn't get their name though. We then got a cab back to the hotel who took us to the wrong one first and then when we did get to the right hotel threatened to call the police when we refused to pay the subsequent expensive meter bill. After a brief argument we reached an agreement and he left us on speaking terms.

The next day we drove into Austin and looked round the Capitol building before having lunch at the Dog and Duck public house, which was a nice, friendly stop. We then walked round the centre of town before heading to the Congress Bridge to see the bats leaving their dwelling at dusk. 1.5 million bats live in the bridge and it was an amazing sight to see them flying off to feed. We then tried to find a recommended BBQ place but had to give up as we got a bit lost and the directions we had didn't make much sense so we ended up buying some frozen curries and utilising the microwave in our room. We are on a budget after all. It turned out to be a tasty and cheap meal. The next day we headed North towards New Mexico, which was a long drive so we stopped in Pecos for the night. Nothing there and nothing to really write about. The busiest restaurant in town was actually quite poor and our hotel room was O.K. but nothing special for the money. We were desperate to start camping but at this stage it was still too hot. The next day we left Texas and hit New Mexico on our way to Roswell.

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