The main reason for our trip was to go to a big Family Reunion in Utopia, Texas. A tiny town, less than 400 people! We got to see aunts, uncles, cousins, our in-laws, the family children! And we ate! Oh the delicious and amazing things we ate! I'm so friggin' slow to blog (whaddya know? Back to business as usual!) that these memories are not fresh in my mind - but the pictures should at the very least help me layout the timeline, eh? It all started when we packed up and drove to Phoenix during our extreme and extended freakin' heatwave. It was nice to leave town, I tell you what. (Yes, that Hank Hill quote is on purpose.)
We started our dining experience with a couple of Texas brewskies, one of which was an Alamo Beer. An Alamo Beer!
Yeah! Just like that Alamo Beer!!!
Except ours looked more like:
It came with this ice cold little glass, it was delicious and refreshing! I think it's safe to say, I am an Alamo Beer fan. I can't tell you how much joy and pride that gives me. (Yes, because of King of the Hill!)
We also tried these 2 Texas beers:
And we ate, I swear we ate. We didn't just get hammered on a bunch of beer. Our lunch choice consisted of delicious sirloin skewers. The meat was tender and flavorful! We also enjoyed some onion rings, and these flat, thick, fried, delicious potatoes. It was part fry, part chip - fantastic. With full bellies, we were Utipia bound!
We stopped at our first (of many) HEB supermarkets. HEB is all over the place in Texas! This particular stop was to procure some bug spray, as well as a couple of other items I can't quite recall. Though I do remember we loaded up on snacks. It's also where we saw a large, lovely display of Zima with it's "for a limited time only!" sign, so we had to partake! I do have one photo of the illusive Zima, I'll share momentarily. I wanted to mention this though, because we stopped a lot at those HEB stores. One day, when I'm re-reading blog posts to relive my vacations, I think I'll want to remember this part. Why not mention that?
For visual reference:
Just now, as I was image searching to find a visual reference, I found this next photo. And I giggled like Beavis and Butthead (another Mike Judge show, reference to KOTH - thank you!)
Alright, distraction complete - Back to the trip! On our way to Utopia the scenery was lush with rolling hills, tons of wildlife and so much GREEN! One of our favorite stories to tell is when we played chicken with a turkey. On our way to utopia we saw a large bird on the side of the road, as we got closer we saw that it was a turkey, we were amazed to see a real wild turkey! Then he darted out in front of us - so we hit the brakes. As soon as we were stopped for him to safely cross, he darted back to the side of the road. We let off the brakes once more, and again he darted out in front of us. We stopped, then he ran back into the brush. This time though, he kept going further into said brush instead of back out into the street, smart move bird. It was quite charming, I must admit.
We landed at one of the houses our family had rented and proceeded to unwind on a glorious deck with a view of a beautiful river, delicious meat from the grill to enjoy, and of course - family time!
That night, on our way to the 2nd house the family rented (and the one we'd ultimately be staying in) we crossed paths with no less than 15 deer. They were everywhere! It was amazing. When we landed at house #2, we stayed up with the family sharing stories, snacking on pringles and zima (not even kidding) and just loving life. Here's that photo of the Zima I promised earlier:
~aah~ so crisp, so refreshing
The next day was Saturday. The day of the big reunion! I remember waking up and peeking out our bedroom window to the mini-farm across the street from us. I was so impressed! We come from Tucson, there's no lush mini farms in your front yard in Tucson! I was awe-struck.
We all took a very short stroll up the road to the one cafe in town, the Lost Maples Cafe. Dylan had a breakfast taco (which is the Tex Mex answer to the breakfast burrito.) I had ... eggs and toast I think. The cafe was charming, the kids got hot chocolate, and the coffee was fantastic. That trip to the Lost Maples Cafe was how we learned about the movie "Seven Days in Utopia" which we still have yet to watch, even though we kept saying we need to watch it.
Alright, onto the reunion! Now, you all know the rules. Folks didn't give me permission + there's lots of kids, so you ain't getting any family photos. I can share the river though! Check it out:
Dylan was a super fun uncle this trip and spent lots of time frolicking with the kids in that river. He told me the water was fantastic, I just ... didn't muster up the motivation to get in myself.
We had so much amazing and delicious food all day long at the reunion. I was too busy stuffing my face and visiting to document any of it, but I can attest to it being a great time.
That night everyone was pretty well into their food coma so we settled in, watched some TV, enjoyed the beautiful river, went out after sundown to see some fireflies buzzing about (that was amazing!) Retired back to our home away from home and woke up Sunday morning with plans for a big brunch with the extended family. We had a little time that morning to poke around Utopia. We learned (duh!) on Sunday in a small town: pretty much everything is closed. Not the Lost Maples Cafe though! This time Dylan enjoyed the lamb sliders while I had a patty melt. Then everyone traded bites of pie.
After that, Dylan and I were headed back to San Antonio. Before we left our little home away from home, however, I managed to go a little picture crazy on the details:
This was our room (that there's the window facing the fantastic mini-farm across the way)
Hanging around the house were these neat paintings on saws - I'd never seen such a thing!
The decor was adorable, all of these awesome collectible cow figurines + tiny little furniture! One of my absolute favorite things!
These whirlwind trips are a blast I tell you, but man does time fly. No sooner had we settled in were we packing up to head out once more. On Sunday we drove back to San Antonio. We meandered around a couple of little towns along the way. Snag: that whole Sunday thing. Almost nothing was open, but that didn't stop us from poking around. (And, perhaps Pokemon-ing around, hah! YES we're still playing Pokemon Go. Deal with it.)
We had two pit stops, Castroville and Hondo. Both of these are charming little towns, both of these are between Utopia, TX and San Antonio, TX. I have a recollection of stopping - but I can't for the life of me recall which charming, historic side trip was in which town. *cough* My bad. There was a point where we thought a cup of coffee sounded nice. We tried to GPS to a place that we could not find to save our lives. We drove around for awhile and spotted this sign:
But it was a lie.
This once gas-station, turned coffee shop was freaking adorable! But, closed on Sundays. So we putzed around a little, saw this adorable sculpture outside a gift shop that - you guessed it - was closed.
Though hope for coffee was not lost, as an adorable little cafe was open and just a hop skip and a jump away. We first asked the 2 young ladies manning the hostess station if we could have some iced coffee to go and they were a little confused. The owner of the cafe, however, swopped in to save us. And she made us a killer couple of brews, too. While we waited, we met this friendly restaurant kittah. His name is Cheez-It. Perfect, right?
Don't worry, I pet him too.
They also had this stellar view:
We stopped at a few old, lovely churches. Sure, because they were Pokestops, but also because they were so historic! And pretty!
This particular little town was riddled with history. French roots. They had a bunch of French street names and they had even brought over a building, plank by plank - from France.
At some point, we did find an open and charming antique store that used to be a movie theatre.
This was one of those big wooden hanging spoon/fork deals, but I really liked the detail of the man carved on top.
And this lovely ceramic article that looks exactly like Baxter.
Before nightfall we were off to San Antonio. We met up with, had dinner and stayed with a friend of ours who is a resident. We checked out the Riverwalk & the Alamo ~at night~
Okay, fine. Spongebob is in no way a King of the Hill reference (though I could argue either animation, or things Emily loves, but it's a stretch.) But when I said ~at night~ this was the exact image/sound/moment in my mind.
See, things are pretty slick ~at night~ They also had these bedazzled horse & carriage things going around the city:
How cool is that?
We popped into a couple of historic hotels for sight seeing and cocktails
There was taxidermy, and I'm talking huge, impressive taxidermy - pretty much everywhere you went in this particular part of Texas.
Snagged a photo op @ this old-timey phone booth:
Then there's this painting. I remember this painting, and the photo does not do it justice. That painting was damn near the size of an entire wall of my bedroom!
The next morning we decided to head out and be tourists in the daylight. We found a fun quasi-brunch spot where we enjoyed a couple of libations and some ceviche
It's worth noting this place had the 2nd coolest bathroom markers I've ever seen. (Marge & Homer Simpson @ Universal Studios taking the #1 slot) Is it weird to notice/appreciate this kind of stuff? Sure it is. But I pity the fool who doesn't enjoy the little things in life!
Next stop: The Alamo! They asked that we not take photos inside, so I got this on one our way in:
We walked the grounds, read the plaques, spent money at the gift shop then stopped for some more items to eat! This was a pizza place, you could order by the slice and they had the best stuff up on the walls!
Just like that, it was time to head back to the airport and travel back to home sweet home! The trip home was eventful. I think it's worth noting that the staff at the San Antonio Airport are the friendliest, most excellent, amazing freaking TSA agents on the planet. Every interaction we had with them was great. I think they should be in charge of training the whole friggin country. /end rant.
The extreme heat in Arizona was ongoing, and there were some flights leaving Phoenix that day that couldn't take off. We had a delay on our flight going into Phx, but luckily that's all it was - a delay. I remember we went from a freezing airplane, to the tube that almost reminded you "oh yeah, it's hot out, we're in Phoenix." Then we entered a freezing airport, we got onto a freezing tram, and as the tram doors opened for us to get on the shuttle to take us to our car - WOOSH. The heat. It was exactly like opening the oven door. 0_0 It was crazy!! I snagged this photo of the temp on our drive back to Tucson because it blew my mind. THE SUN WAS DOWN!
Nothing like a heat-slap to the face to remind you you're home again. There we have it folks, a long winded - long overdue recap of our quick visit to a small portion of Texas. See you guys next time!
