Most of our vacations were limited to the state of California because with 3-4 kids and sometimes some of their friends or cousins it was just easier. But in 1975 we packed up Kim, Billy, Bobby and cousin Wendy for a long trip to visit my sister and family in Houston Texas. I kept a diary of the trip but can't find it...I remember rereading it 10 or 20 years ago and maybe I threw it out. There were comments such as we stopped at McDonald's for lunch and it cost us $10 (this is for six of us mind you!). We stopped for gas and it would cost less than $10 to fill up (back when gas was less than $1 a gallon). Then there was the hotel we stayed at in El Paso where we paid $15 for the room and got a free breakfast for all plus we could all sleep in one room! (I'm not sure with 6 of us in a room we got much sleep)! What a gold mine that was....we had driven from Tucson to El Paso and the kids were hot and tired. There was a pool at the hotel and the first thing most of them did was jump in it.
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| The Alamo |
We then drove from El Paso to San Antonio where we had dinner and visited the Alamo....and it still being about 8pm and only a couple more hours to Houston (or so we thought) we packed up and made the trip, arriving in the middle of the night (somewhere around 3am). In hindsight we should have spent the night in San Antonio - but then that's what memories are made of!
Bobby was only 5 years old when we took the trip - the only things he says he remembers are the nights stay with Uncle Jim (my brother) and family in Tucson, Uncle Jim taking all of them to the air museum at Davis Monthan Air Force Base (where Jim was stationed), and a visit to the Astro-Dome in Houston.
Kim and Wendy were 6 1/2 and Wendy remembers a LOT. I'm impressed since she was so young. I'm sure Bill remembers a lot too as he was 8 when we took the trip.
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| Busch Gardens |
"I remember:
-stopping in Palm Springs at a friend of yours house (they had a pool and we needed to nap)
-eating cheese cubes and sitting in the back of the station wagon
-low level bickering with the boys to pass the time
-passing funny roadside attractions (was there a giant tepee?). Bill had quite a bit of money he'd been saving up for souvenirs so in the run up to each place there was much pleading and fast talking to get you guys to pull over
-waking up in the night to you and Uncle Howard having a small fight (because that is what couples do when it is 3 am and they have been driving all night and I think there was some fear we had missed a turn)
-finally getting to stop at a hotel in the middle of the day. It was very nice - a Holiday Inn I think. Everyone else was so excited for the pool but all I could think about was napping in the air conditioning:)
"And that was just the trip there! Then there was AstroWorld, the Alamo, and the Air and Space Museum. Pretty cool stuff!"
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| Mark's Birthday Party |
Mary Post Warren
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p.s. the 'giant tepee' was somewhere between Phoenix and Tucson (or so I'm told by son Robert)
I think that is a picture of me by the plaque at the Alamo. Don't remember it but i am wearing the same shirt in the other pictures. only other think I remember for some reason is Uncle Gerry and Aunt Martha had a sliding glass door to their back yard in Texas. Might have rained and I watched the rain through it.
ReplyDeleteLove Rob
it's you. The picture was noted that. But I just noticed that you had the same shirt on in all 3 pictures I took - did you only pack one shirt???? :) Thanks for commenting.
ReplyDeleteSorry Rob but we did not have a sliding glass door in our house in Texas nor in our house in Louisiana
ReplyDeleteWe did have a large bay window in the front in Texas.