Author Topic: I Love Texas (Read 5616 times)

Jackal1 · « **Reply #135 on:** February 26, 2006, 08:51:52 AM »

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Originally posted by Gunslinger
Keep in mind i'm making this trip in a Uhaul following my wife who will have 2 kids in the car.

Hehe! My brother and myself left Sweetwater, Tx. one pleasant day with the temp about 110 or so. We were in a n old Uhaul with no AC. The wife, my sister-in-law and our dog were in our car keeping pace with us. They had a cooler in the car and would pull up beside us sipping cold drinks enjoying the AC just to rub it in. The Uhaul seemed to be missing most of the firewall insulation so it was like being in a blast furnace on wheels.

rpm · « **Reply #136 on:** February 26, 2006, 09:50:53 AM »

Try driving a 1974 Freightliner cabover with no a/c across the desert sometime.

Jackal1 · « **Reply #137 on:** February 26, 2006, 10:03:41 AM »

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Originally posted by rpm
Try driving a 1974 Freightliner cabover with no a/c across the desert sometime.

Hehe. I drove a non-AC Mack a couple of years in west Texas in my younger days. Never again.

There was a guy in Wolfe City who asked me to haul a load of honey bees from Navasota , Texas to North Dakota in one of his trucks one time. Luckily he had a load of paper products to be picked up in Dallas and brought back to a printing company before I got to the bees.

He had put the truck together himself. It was a CO Freightliner with a 350 Cummins. He had failed to put the insulation between the floor and cab in while he was creating.

On the short trip to Dallas and back my feet got blistered through my boots. I respectfully (not) told him what he could do with his Fruitliner and fricking bees.

lazs2 · « **Reply #138 on:** February 26, 2006, 10:04:25 AM »

beet.... england would fall into Texas and dissapear... it would be a small part of Texas with universaly bad weather.

Travel is good... people travel to see new things. Someone else pointed out that england had the most boring people on earth... that is a good reason to travel from there. The U.S. is compossed of states it is as beet says... only 2% of the earths surface (course 66% is water but that is hard to vacation on). Most Americans have been to Mexico and Canada... The North American continent is frigging huge and very diverse.

Flying around and checking out the resteraunts and wine sellers in every major city or looking at their attractions is not seeing the country. Some travel that way tho... others exscew the touristy stuff and make their own way... the latter is more expensive and time consuming and you don't see as much but.... ultimately more satisfying.

I think I might have got a better idea of Dallas say by hanging out with the modified Healey guys at a car event and doing some street racing and such than by visiting some famous resteraunt or tourist trap.

conversely... if you travel it is fine to get on the tour bus and get an overview of the city and some history. but... I don't think the latter tells you much more than a book would.

lazs

Jackal1 · « **Reply #139 on:** February 26, 2006, 10:11:53 AM »

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Originally posted by lazs2
beet.... england would fall into Texas and dissapear

At which point it would be promptly set upon with much glee and destroyed by us redneck, small town bigots.

Toad · « **Reply #140 on:** February 26, 2006, 10:12:13 AM »

"The sun has rizz, the sun has setsez,
Drove all day, still in Texas".

Ain't THAT the truth.

Jackal1 · « **Reply #141 on:** February 26, 2006, 10:17:45 AM »

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Originally posted by Toad
"The sun has rizz, the sun has setsez,
Drove all day, still in Texas".

Ain't THAT the truth.

Brownsville to Dalhart driving mileage 961.3 miles.
But hey...it`s not all that grand .

Curval · « **Reply #142 on:** February 26, 2006, 10:22:35 AM »

I went to Ocean City Maryland some years back.

First time I went I did the tourist trap nonsense on the boardwalk. It SUCKED.

Next time I went to a bar full of locals who were big into sailing. I think I bought one drink all night...and ended up hurling in the bathroom of the bar. I "think" I had a great time.

Regardless....I know all about Maryland now. Those yachting types are PERFECT examples of the average Maryland residents. It was like a cross section of the entire Maryland population.

P.S. Given that you can fit 2 Texas into Ontario, the latter must be twice as great.

beet1e · « **Reply #143 on:** February 26, 2006, 11:38:10 AM »

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Originally posted by lazs2
beet.... england would fall into Texas and dissapear...

...and TX would have bad indigestion!

You're right in a way - I firmly believe that the only way to really know a country is to live there, and have to use their language as you go about your daily business. One thing I know for sure is that you cannot rely on news media in one country to report accurately the events in another. I always remember when I lived in CA, not that far from where Lazs lives now. It was 1981, and the local rag was reporting an incipient civil war in Britain! (The Toxteth/Croxteth unemployment riots) I phoned my brother and he said naaah, just a few bananas having a punch up with the police, and a spate of copycat riots...

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Brownsville to Dalhart driving mileage 961.3 miles.
But hey...it`s not all that grand .

Calais, France to Seville, Spain - 1012 miles. Hmm, didn't seem that far... Didn't know there was a Sweetwater, TX - but I've been to Sweetwater, TN. Some interesting caves there.

Krusher · « **Reply #144 on:** February 26, 2006, 12:28:40 PM »

Krusher · « **Reply #145 on:** February 26, 2006, 12:42:28 PM »

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Originally posted by beet1e
One of those drives across France was actually to get to Spain. France and Spain combine to fill an area of over 400,000 square miles (as compared with ~268,000 for TX), so yes I know what it's like doing those long drives. Don't know about France, but Spain certainly has desert, and the 1960s Clint Eastwood spaghetti westerns were filmed there. What are 115 degree temps? That's hotter than it gets anywhere in the world. Oh wait, you meant 46° - it certainly gets over 40° in Spain, France too I believe...

Did someone say Carlsbad? Been there, done the caves... but I think there's another Carlsbad in CA?

just an fyi~
It's almost 900 miles from El Paso to Beaumont, around 14 hours of driving. Thats just shy of state line to state lane. It is about as far from Los Angles CA. to El Paso TX as it is from El Paso to Houston.

beet1e · « **Reply #146 on:** February 26, 2006, 12:47:14 PM »

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Originally posted by Krusher
just an fyi~
It's almost 900 miles from El Paso to Beaumont, around 14 hours of driving. Thats just shy of state line to state lane. It is about as far from Los Angles CA. to El Paso TX as it is from El Paso to Houston.

Must be a winding road, because the straight line distance between El Paso and Beaumont is 739 miles.

Jackal1 · « **Reply #147 on:** February 26, 2006, 04:59:34 PM »

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Originally posted by beet1e
Calais, France to Seville, Spain - 1012 miles.

Two countries, not one state. I could quote the distance from Moscow to Mexico City, but I don`t see where it would pertain to Texas.

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Didn't know there was a Sweetwater, TX [/B]

[/QUOTE]

West of Abilene. Take my word for it.

beet1e · « **Reply #148 on:** February 26, 2006, 05:34:01 PM »

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Originally posted by Jackal1
Two countries, not one state. I could quote the distance from Moscow to Mexico City, but I don`t see where it would pertain to Texas.

...and your point is - ? Look at it this way, Jack. You have a 268,000 sq. mile area which you consider as your "back yard". Fine, and it just so happens that every sq. mile within this piece of real estate is known collectively by a single name - Texas. Well, I consider places like France/Spain as my back yard. I go there often, and have legal entitlement to live in either one if I so choose. Contrary to what you might think, I don't have to seek permission from HM the Queen! That particular back yard is 400,000+ sq. miles. The point is that some people are gasping about the size of Texas, and how long it takes to drive across, but hey - my back yard is more diverse. Travelling from home to central Spain, I would encounter four different languages - English, French, Spanish and Catalan. Our man CyranoAH speaks all four, and speaks them well!:eek: I last did this journey in 2002. A 6 hour ferry journey, then two overnight stops - Chartres and Carcasonne, rolling into Spain on Day3. Total round trip mileage ~2400.

I'm sure TX is very nice, but please don't tell me that it's the only place in the world where you can go for a long drive. Because it isn't.

And now, I must rest my head. My friend will be coming in from Miami early tomorrow morning. Have a wonderful evening.

Toodle Pip.

Skuzzy · « **Reply #149 on:** February 26, 2006, 09:20:22 PM »

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Originally posted by beet1e
Snip

Beet1e, the culture is more diverse than in England, but it is also spread all over the state. The few places you listed as visiting cover a small percentage of the social and cultural diversity in this state.

Please understand, I am not putting England down at all. I really enjoyed the trips to England.

Also note, the size of Texas helps to explain the diverse the cliamte one can experience here, but it also hides other diversities. The strong Germanic an Asian communities, along with thier culture would have been missed where you visited. And that is just the tip of the iceberg.

Point being, in its size, lies a diverse population and cultures. You cannot hope to experience Texas by visiting a few of the cities here. I have been here all my life and still am surprised by how much more I still have to learn about this state. And I have been everywhere in this state.