:: Late last week we went to Texas to visit Austin, TX, but our little extended weekend vacay took a different turn, and we ended up in Dallas, TX.
Perhaps you heard about Hurricane Patricia?
While both cities were soaked by this unprecedented storm, after getting to Texas, driving to Austin & finding ourselves in the moldiest suburban Hilton Garden Inn room ever, we reconsidered our plans & decided to focus on Dallas instead of messing around with Austin, which was more directly in the path of the storm.
And had unbelievably expensive hotel rooms. [$200.00 per night for a downtown budget Motel 6 room. That’s without taxes. And, of course, no room service available in the place.]
Photo of bleak wet world as seen from room window in Marriott Hotel at Legacy Town Center in Plano, TX, October 2015.
:: I’m glad that we made a change in our plans and chose to goof-off in Dallas, even though the whole region had the most amazingly consistent gray sky that I’ve ever seen.
A sky that some might be tempted to say was gloomy and foreboding.
A sky that seemed to hover over us as we drove around Dallas on about seventy hundred thousand different highways, toll roads, expressways + freeways, in the rain, while Siri told us how to reroute ourselves to avoid flash flooding.
:: So what did we do? Activities that kept us dry, of course.
- We visited the Dallas Museum of Art [fascinating American silver collection, Islamic art + Inca artifacts].
- We visited the Museum of Geometric and MADI Art [art displayed partly in museum and partly in law firm that shares the building with the museum].
- We drove to, but were unable to see, the Heritage Farmstead Museum in Plano, TX, because it was closed due to flooding.
- Then, despite my dislike of malls, we went to NorthPark Center, an upscale 50-year-old mall, incredibly clean– and about as soulless as a mall can get.
- Continuing on went to another mall, The Shops at Willow Bend, which for a mall wasn’t so bad. I guess. Zen-Den bought a few shirts at Dillard’s, so not a total waste of time.
:: Do I have a conclusion? Well, I don’t know. Sort of.
All I can tell you, gentle readers, is that I am not unfamiliar with vacations not going as planned. I am nothing if not adaptable. Meaning that while I didn’t return from our vacation rejuvenated by local cuisine, music and artsy-fartsy Austin stuff, I’m happy that I got to see a little bit of Dallas, TX.
Which is massive, affluent, with lots of new buildings, friendly people and, in my experience, incredibly wet. 😉
Just because we were in Columbus OH overnight and just because I remembered going to this park when I was a child and just because it was a gorgeous clear summer morning, we went to the Park of Roses.
THE SPECTACLED BEAN 