2014 Days Three into Four

Tuesday, July 1

This is what happens to your eyes bright and early in the morning on your first day in Dallas, Texas when you forget your sunglasses.  Our friend took us on a small driving tour of the Dallas area.  We saw downtown and several neighborhoods.  Like many cities, as we've learned, the downtown really isn't the main attraction. Our friend lives about 10-15 minutes outside of this business district.  Above is outside of a museum whose name escapes me.  These signs are in several places around town.  Everything is bigger in Texas after all I suppose.  We stopped in at a place called Stupid Good coffee.  Liars.  The place was buried inside of an office building too.

Just a view of one of the downtown blocks.  Tall buildings as usual.  Most of it is just business though, and it wasn't very lively on the streets on this Tuesday morning.  We didn't stay here long and moved on to breakfast back in our friend's neighborhood, Oak Lawn.

Anyways, today was the USA World Cup game, so we were looking for somewhere fun to watch it.  Our first stop took us into the Greenville section, to a place called the Truck Yard.  Pretty awesome spot.

Smart bar concept.  They did have a cheesesteak station inside, however they were really mostly just a bar.  The food outside came from one of two food trucks:  a typical bar/fried food grill, and a Korean BBQ truck.  They had a large projector screen outside to watch the game.  We did not end up staying though.  Apparently police had set up multiple DUI checks in the surrounding area.  Being that we were about a 15-20 minute drive away we decided to enjoy one drink and head back.

Just a quick public service announcement to make sure you stay safe...

We watched the game between two gay bars back in Oak Lawn.  After our disappointing loss in extra time, we were back at his complex and spent most of the rest of the day back at the pool.  This day turned out to be more of a relaxing day in the hot (95-98 degree) sun as opposed to a day of tourism. This came appreciated since we tend to push ourselves to the limits of exhaustion on these road trips, particularly this slightly shorter spanning one.

After passing out three or four times by the pool, it was time to get dinner and finish the night.  We were to be up early in the morning after all.  But first, let me take a selfie.

(Sorry, I had to do that at some point..)

We watched the sun set from the roof of one last bar for the night.  We reminded ourselves that it was Tuesday, and trashy or not we had to get back to bed.  If nothing else, to let our friend get rest for work early tomorrow.

Wednesday, July 2nd

I stood on the balcony of our friend's apartment to say my last goodbyes to the city of Dallas, and really to Texas.  A big thank you to our friend Adam for letting us stay two nights at his place making this trip really more possible.

We were back on the road by 730AM.

75MPH speed limits really make doing 80-85 feel legal, and helps us make up for some time lost getting gas and etc.  Shortly after the Louisiana border we were in the small city of Shreveport.  It's a pretty nice town, seems to be a few unique small places to enjoy.  We stopped for coffee and were hoping for lunch, but were reminded it is only 10 AM and most places don't have Lunch until at least 11.  We did find a place that had just opened and grabbed a bite.  Catfish Po Boys!  It's official, we were really in Louisiana.

So f*ng delicious.

Remember our itinerary change mentioned last post? We've extended our trip by a day, and we are currently heading to New Orleans!  Our original plan was putting us into Birmingham Alabama tonight, but we're instead heading south on I-49 and heading to the Gulf of Mexico.  Booked a last minute hotel in the French Quarter, extended the car rental by a day, and made arrangements for my buddy Half Pint (whom it is killing me to be away from, by the way).  Off we are.  We'll still see Alabama tomorrow, but the exact destinations will really depend on the trip.  

Looking forward to getting a little messy later, but first we'll be driving past the Villalobos pitbull rescue center.  According to our time calculations they'll unfortunately be closed when we arrive (past 3PM CST) but how could we not at least take a look.

For now enjoy our beautiful view of interstate 49 south.

Talk later!