I had to go to work on Tuesday. So, Yagi-san stayed at home and packed. However, I did have one of neighbors, Angelo, come over for a few hours to chat.
That night, my mom go the kids a dog:
That night we went to Pappasitos with some friends to give Yagi-san a taste of margaritas and fajitas
And of course, we came home and played some Shogi… (I am already missing our Shogi games…)
We went with some friends to Galveston
First we went to the Ocean Star offshore drilling platform museum.
It was a little cold, so Stephen wore my jacket…
Then we visited the Hotel Galvez, which I thought was built before the flood. But actually it was built several years afterwards:
then we went to the Titantic exhibit at Moody gardens. They give everyone a different "boarding pass" with information about a passenger. You do not find out until the end if they died or not.
My guy died…
Then we went to the beach and Yagi-san touched the Gulf of Mexico
Next we rode across on the ferry:
Then we went back home, and played some more Shogi
Headed back to Houston. Ate breakfast at McDonalds on the way:
We went back to my house and rested for a while. Then we went to the Woodlands for Easter dinner with my dad and Carole. Stephen and Amma played Shogi while we waited for a seat at the Cheese Cake Factory:
Afterwards, we went home and worked on our garden:
We had dinner at our house that night:
And I play Yagi-san some more Shogi…Here are some shots of the ending
Breakfast at the Hilton… worked on teaching Christopher Shogi while we were waiting… (Do you know Shogi? you should.. check out http://www.IPlayShogi.com)
Then we went Canoeing on Village Creek (feeds into the Neches near the Big Thicket national preserve)
Then we ate Dinner at Fuddruckers. And played Shogi (seeing a trend?)
Then we went to Spindletop
Then we dropped Sonia, Stephen, and Christopher at the hotel.. then Yagi-san and I went to Orange.
We went to the Stark Art Museum
We missed the last tour of the Stark house by 15 minutes… At the Stark house they have a Neopolean death mask…I remember seeing it when I went on a tour in high school… There are only three in the world… one in Paris, on in Washington DC and one in Orange Texas
We got some pictures of the outside thought
Then we went to Shangra La, but did not see much there:
Then we drove over to Louisiana. The visitor center was closed, but they left some maps and handouts on the front step.
We went back to the Texas center and they were closed too. But they didn’t leave handouts.
Then we headed back to the hotel..
On the way to Beaumont, we stopped at subway
And then we stopped at the Ben J. Rogers Regional Visitors center where we found the most wonderful people to help us. If you are traveling towards Beaumont on I-10 from Houston, then you should definitely stop by and visit.
Next we visited Gator Country. It was actually before the Visitor Center in geography, but we didn’t know about it. So after getting the information from the visitor center, we turned around and drove the 8 miles are so to see it.
They had lots of alligators and crocodiles.
Also, they had a snake that I got to hold.
stephen got to hold a baby alligator
This is there motto at Gator Country: "Quick Hands or NO hands"
Even Yagi-san held an alligator
Then we went to the Hilton in Beaumont and then ate at Johnny Carino’s Country Italian restaurant next door.
Stephen and Yagi-san played Shogi while we waited for our food…. (This is a good time to mention that we are building a site to teach people to play Shogi and to help them learn about the game. Check out http://www.IPlayShogi.com when you get a chance.. Not much there but a few pointers to other sites… but you might want to at least book mark it.
After eating, we went bowling.
Then we called it a day and went to bed… very busy day the next day.
Thursday, we spent in Houston. We went to Minute Maid park for a tour.
See! yagi-san really likes baseball. We were trying to convince him to stay another week or so to see the opening game.
We also went to the downtown aquarium.
And then headed off to the Gallaria. We were thinking about going ice skating, but there was only 15 minutes left to the public session. So we sat and had an ice cream instead.
We left the La Quinta (which is a lot nicer than the Rodeway Inn). One note about La Quinta next to the capitol… you can’t really see it in the picture below, but there is a stop sign with a note that "All parking spots are Valet Parking"… When they say, "All", they don’t mean just this level, but every level in the parking… So that means adding $12/day to your stay.
First stop, Capitol building… (one note about grammar that my son has set me straight on.. Capitol with the "-ol" is the name of the building and capital with the -al is everything else, e.g. name of the city, big letters, etc.
saw the dome…
Senate chambers (picture below) and the representative chambers
Next stop was the "Story of Texas" Texas history museum.. Unfortunately they did not allow pictures in the exhibit hall. So despite spending most of the day there, I really don’t have many good pictures… other than Yagi-san in front of the big star…
We caught the ‘Dillo. It is a free bus service around the downtown Austin area. We took it to the LBJ library.
This is the main room in the LBJ library. All those red boxes contain all the documents of the LBJ presidency.
we were lucky today… There was an actor pretending to be Senator Johnson. He answered any questions we had and gave a speech. It was pretty cool.
Then we caught the ‘Dillo back to our hotel. The wait was a little long.. so we rested while we waited…
Then we went to Bastrop to wait for my mom. Our original plan was to spend the night at my Aunt’s ranch… however, she was not feeling well, so we went back to Houston. While we waited for my mom, we ate at a mexican food place in Bastrop. There were performers at Mexican food place.
My mom was a little delayed from her trip from Mexico. So we needed to kill some time. So I got a car washed. This is the picture before the wash. It is so dirty because on the way from Natural Bridge Caverns, it started raining MUD… Can you believe? MUD? Each drop of water had dirt in it.
My mom and uncle showed up. And then I got my mom and we headed back to Houston
Breakfast at IHOP. Stephen and Yagi-san play the "dot" game.
Went to Natural Bridge Caverns
I was really happy that I bought the tickets online. I didn’t have to wait in this line! I just went to the front. (Can you see the door from here? Yep, it is that long.)
While we waited for our tour, the kids got to pan for different gems. You buy a bag of dirt and sift through it looking for the rocks and gems.
Here are the gems we were looking for.
Here is Stephen and Yagi-san in the cavern:
They are very big about not touching. I am glad to report that the children were able to respect this rule.
Then we went to the widelife ranch next door. We saw many exciting things there (pictures are not in order…)
Then we headed off to Austin. On the way we stop at Macaroni Grill.
Breakfast at Denny’s
Mexican Market
San Antonio is one of my dad’s favorite places to visit. We used to come here all the time. And we were here in 1992 when the Governor from Arkansas, Bill Clinton, cam to San Antonio to campaign. We were staying in my dad’s favorite hotel, the Menger. And Bill Clinton was staying there too (I think..) I remember there being a big crowd of people outside of the hotel, and barely seeing Bill Clinton.
Well, Bill Clinton likes to jog. And there is a painting of him at La Terra with him jogging. It is one of those things that you remember, that you have to find. Anyway, find it I did:
Apparently Mr. Clinton was here a few weeks ago for the Texas Primaries. And he signed the picture:
Apparently John McCain had come at the same time and it was kind of crazy there…
We also got to listen to live music:
We also saw a high school cheerleading squad
La Villita (Lunch here)
There was this very cute chess set. The Spanish Conquistadors against the native americans. I would have gotten it if it wasn’t $50… Maybe next time…
Spanish Governor’s Palace
The children got to play with replicas of toys that were common back when the Spanish Governor’s palace was in use.
Two missions on the mission trail
San Juan mission:
Mission Espada
Dinner at Luby’s
Take the bus around
We had a really cool bus driver that let the children take a picture driving the bus..
McDonalds for breakfast
Boat tour on the river walk
Museum of American cultures
I was particularly interested in the Japanese influence in Texas.
The kids found this weaving activity. They want to create a frame like this at home and start working on making cloth…
St. Patrick Parade…. (maybe not…)
Chili’s for lunch
walking around the river walk.
Jim Cullum’s Landing – Jazz cafe
Tower of the Americas
