To Texas - and Beyond!

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Today closes up two long days for us. We arrived in the Nashville area and got to our hotel just before 11:00 PM, after leaving Texas this morning. Monday morning saw us heading out of Roswell, NM.


We crossed over into Texas and saw lots of trains. Our end of day stop was to be at the house of my friend Tony, who lives outside of Dallas, but we wanted to see a few various things along the way. So we went out of way to do that, which made us a little later then expected in getting there.


The first stop of the day was Cadillac Ranch outside of Amarillo, TX. Originally a RT66 roadside attraction, it now sits along I-40.

Ten Cadillacs, from the late '40s into the '60s are buried nose-down in the sand. It's both a sort of sculpture and a place for visitors to leave their mark.

Visitors are allowed and encouraged to adorn the cars with spray paint, marker, whatever floats their boat. You can pretty much assume that whatever you paint will be covered over by someone else before long, and the paint on them was pretty thick.

So, of course, we followed suit...




We then headed east on 40, past various other US66 landmarks, including the intentionally-tipping water tower.

We got off of the highway in Shamrock, TX to drive through town. I wanted to see the Conoco Tower/U-Drop-In building, now restored and in service as the local chamber of commerse. If that building looks familiar, it might be because its distinctive art-deco architecture was closely patterned in the movie "Cars" for Ramone's body shop.

Anyway, we wisked along through northern Texas, briefly into Oklahoma, then back into Texas again before arriving at Tony's place. He and his wife put on an impressive Texas-style bbq, with smoked sausage, smoked turkey, beef brisket, beans, salads, etc. He even specially grilled up some portabello mushrooms for Jacquie because he remembered that had at some point mentioned she's a vegetarian. It was all fantastic, and we had a great time catching up and stuff.

So that brings us up to this morning. Today was actually pretty uneventful, being the first day that solely designated to driving just to cover ground. We only stopped for gas and food.

Not wanting to let the day pass without photos, here's a shot of DarkStar reflected in a tractor-trailer wheel.

In any case, we'll head out of here in the morning and go to Great Smoky Mountain National Park. That'll bring us back to camping and hiking. It should provide an interesting contrast to the parks of the southwest. Anyway, that's all for now. It's late and I'm tired...

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Comments

[Mom]

Great Adventures
Hey guys, You are having some wonderful experiences in your travels. The pictures are so cool. I'm printing them. Miss you all See you in a few days. xoxo Mom

[michele]

absoflipplutely nifty sights!
the Cadillac ranch is so neat! i wanna take an x ray through all the paint and find out about people =P and its pretty cool that we have our OWN leaning tower ha take that Europe! o and jack, i remembered what i forgot to tell you...its a bit of information you will absolutely LOVE. ..... but i'll keep you in suspense. =)

[Mommie Island]

Seeking?
Glad my girlies are on their way to me. I see you two finally got to spray paint some graffiti on something! Kudos Ricker Roo on the blogs. This trip will really hold alot of memories for you guys. Cant wait till the next Thurs night chicken feast and the stories you will tell! Miss you guys....xoxoxoxoxo to my twinnies... Deddin