Road Warrior Momma: Day 5

Day 5 – July 1^st

Austin, TX – Carlsbad, NM

477 miles/ 7 hours

Temperature – a Surprisingly, a balmy 75 degrees! ?

Fairfield Inn Carlsbad

Happy July 1^st! Reinforcements have arrivedJ))))! Wooo-Hooo.

But first, I must start at the beginning. Bear had a rough night. He started singing about 2:30 a.m. Hunter appeared to be awake (although he doesn’t remember this), as well. I pleaded with Bear to hush and to go back to sleep. It worked for a little while, but he seemed to rouse me every 20 minutes. I’d had grandiose ideas about hitting the gym at 6.a.m and gave up those aspirations around 4a.m. Finally, somehow, I was able to coax the wild man into slumber about 4:30.

When the alarm went off at 6 I was NOT happy, but I got up anyway. Quickly showered, woke the kids, ushered them to a lackluster buffet, loaded up the luggage cart, and got the car. Then I discovered that we’d (or rather my car) had been BOMBED by birds! It was revolting. Apparently this happens quite a bit, because the hotel gave me a voucher for a carwash at the Circle K. I gratefully took them up on it! I was also hoping it wasn’t an omen for the day.

Luckily our route, heading SW from Austin, was not heavily traveled on a Monday morning! It was truly easy getting out of the city. The drive into the Hill Country of Texas was amazing. I absolutely loved it. We drove through the cutest little town, Fredericksburg, TX, and I really wished we’d had the time to stop and explore. But I was on a mission to pick up daddy! About a half hour after Fredericksburg we dropped off the grid for a while. I was literally in the middle of nowhere; I didn’t even have cell service. Then we made it to I10 and the skies gently opened up. The rain wasn’t so bad, but the grey overcast was a bummer, because the countryside was amazing and I can’t even imagine what it would’ve looked like under full sun and a crystal blue sky. Still – the rolling hills, rocks, and mini mountains were unbelievable

Then we exited I10, heading NW on back roads and our surroundings lost their luster. Very barren and desolate. Kind of spooky, actually. We passed through 3 towns and there were zero lunch options. I kept throwing bags of chips to the back of the car for the kids.

So we made it to Carlsbad and upon first impression, seemed like a one horse town. I have a review due on Monday and I left the book in Dallas (I know, big screw up), so I googled B& N and found one on the University of NM’s Carlsbad campus. Dudes – the campus consists of one big building and the B&N was smaller than the student book store at Loyola University, in 1987! They didn’t have the book.

So we headed to the “airport” to get daddy. The airport terminal is smaller than our first house. And this is the text I got from Rich, while on the Airplane: “For the record…this was the mother of all bad ideas…never again. F*** me.” Uh–oh.

The skies in Carlsbad were clear and sunny, so I figured he was over-reacting, but the texts continued. Richie made it safely, but he sure didn’t look good when we saw him. But how cool is this? We were able to greet him on the tarmac?!?!?! There was no security and the pilot was also the ticket agent. What a throwback. Something to be said about small towns.

We brought him to the hotel and had a quick swim. Then we headed to Chili’s, which appeared to be the top of the line based on my earlier recognizance. Well Chili’s handed me a buzzer and told me it’d be an hour and a half – on a Monday night! Wha-wha? Rich said no. So we went on the hunt. Well that’s the thrill of a road trip, we found Shangri-La, in the form of Yellow Brix, the best damn restaurant in Carlsbad. They had a kids menu that resulted in clean plates, even though Bear’ chicken nuggets were homemade (he usually prefers processed crap). Rich and I got fancy wine. He got a fancy fillet and I got a designer salad that rivaled the Bistros of Sonoma. And we had FUN. Goes to show, you can’t judge a book by it’s cover, I amend my one horse town opinion.

GOOD Day – the gang’s back together!

Quote of the day:

Hunter, with great exasperation, “This is my worst nightmare.” After Audrey spit out a piece of my salad that she’d wanted to taste.