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Houston Vacation: Day Three

nobody@vox.com(Phisch) — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 11:34:32 -0500

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Originally uploaded by Phisch

Short this time. By now, we are all pretty tired---sleeping in strange beds, though comfortable, still doesn't give you the right amount of sleep---but the boys are troupers so they are excited.

We had another great bagel breakfast at Einstein Bros. I tell you, I want a Southern someone to adopt me. Yesterday, the manager happily offered to pour us some whole milk for NM then didn't complain (or charge us) when we switched to lemonade. Today, she let us have a lemonade after NM dropped the first and wouldn't let us pay. I sure didn't mind being called honey or sweetie by her, she meant it!

NASA was great fun and the boys again had a good time. A lot of it was over J's head but so long as he got to do the tram tour and the interactive exhibits, he was fine. Since there was a shuttle launch at Cape Canaveral, we missed the part of the tour where they take you into mission control, more commonly known as the Houston of "Houston, we have a problem." As our tour guide liked to say, "We're like Oz, the guys behind the curtain" of every launch and landing that NASA does. We did get to tour the facility that houses the scale model of the International Space Station plus their tools and equipment used for astronaut training.

We also got to see the only Saturn V rocket around. The mission it was meant for, Apollo 18 was scrapped and it was donated to the Smithsonian. The Smithsonian lent it back and assisted NASA in building a facility to house it. NASA just left it out in the open and it was deteriorating from all the exposure. It's laying on its side, which is good since it would be easier to build a warehouse 300+ ft. wide vs. tall, don't you think? The thing is massive and impressive in its size, though. And the vast majority of it is for its propulsion systems. I guess it just takes that much to get you 25k mph so you can escape Earth's atmosphere.

After the tram tour, the boys did the exhibits. I skipped some like sitting in a scale model of the module that the astronauts came home in, for instance. Claustrophobia pretty much nixes any desire for me to become an astronaut. Imagine days in a closet? I can't. Movies like Apollo 13 are horror films to me! They boys didn't mind in the least! Good for them. They enjoyed all of that stuff. They really enjoyed the really tall playscape as well. J only got lost from his brother once but he didn't really remember that as much as all the fun he had. The science exhibits were all so hands-on that the boys both got something out of them.

We had lunch and since my shrimp bisque (I can still eat shrimp!) was so hot it took me a while, hubby took the boys to see the space shuttle scale model. They both got to sit in it and take photos. There's an amazing number of buttons in the cockpit of that thing.

We left early afternoon for home so we could avoid traffic and have some time left over for hubby to relax since he had to work the next day. That turned out to be a good plan since we were all so tired. It was so nice to sleep in our own beds, the boys were even talking about it on the way home.

What a blessing it was to get to spend three days together doing so much fun stuff. We'll have to plan another trip down there since there was so much left to see that we didn't really get to do.

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Houston Vacation: Day Two

nobody@vox.com(Phisch) — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 15:31:13 -0500

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Originally uploaded by Phisch

Photos here.

We managed to find an Einstein Bros. Bagel shop and had breakfast there. Mmm...is there any bagel sandwich better than capers, cream cheese and lox on an everything bagel? I'm not sure. I would have been happy to eat there at lunch. It turns out we all would have been...read further.

So from the area where our motel sits, it turns out Galveston is about 30 minutes away. It is an island, but apparently a long on and still not that hard to miss a sign when you are looking for it in a less-than-earnest manner. Sorry, houses in bright colors that sit on stilts are a big distraction for me. Besides, I didn't think three pyramids would be that hard to lose. It's easier than I thought.

Anyhow, we drive to Galveston Island proper and find that getting there is an interesting mix of industrial facilities, water, farm land and ranch land. Throw in some homes and you get an idea of what it was like. After we lost sight of Moody Gardens (the pyramids) we decided to go ahead and park and play on the sand. The first place we stopped at was a state park and charged $5 per person since it was really a camping facility. We did find a lot of places where you can get to the beach for free. We even parked on the sand! The temps were low 80s but the wind was very cool so we adults hung out in the truck while the kids ignored the weather and built their sand structures Pools, it turns out. How can you not think of a resort when you're at the beach? There were a couple of jelly fish but the boys could care less as I poked at them. The sand was very fine and the kind that sticks to you for a while so I was happy to have flip flops on (that kind of sand makes me grit my teeth if I touch it).

After a while of chasing waves and pool building, we decided we were hungry and drove in search of a place to eat. Lo and behold! We come across a pastel-colored palace called China Place. A decent Chinese place would have said "Palace" and that should have been our first clue. It was a buffet and at under $7 per person. Both clues. Both ignored. I must say, I've never had such an awful meal. It's up there with the meal we had at Denny's in our BC days that stayed with us for much longer than the aftertaste it left in our mouths. China Place in Galveston, TX does not get our vote. There were paramedics there who had partially eaten their food. They got a call while they were there and left...who knows if they ever came back. If they didn't, it's because something didn't agree with them. There were people coming into the parking lot asking us something and we warned them the food was no good. No elaboration, but maybe they could see it in our faces. They left really quickly. They deep-fried their rolls! Their sauces were an unearthly shade of red orange. My children were saints: they didn't ask for seconds.

Onward to Moody Gardens. It was a collection of huge displays plus a hotel, convention center and Vietnam Memorial. I got the distinct feel that Galveston is trying to recoup a good image it once had and the Gardens were a part of that effort. To visit everything---aquariums, Titanic exhibit, IMAX theaters, ride movies, ride a riverboat, etc.---would have cost $45 per person so we opted to visit just the rain forest pyramid exhibit for less than $40 for all four of us. We chose wisely, almost making up for eating at China Place. The boys enjoyed going inside a pyramid building and on top of that, there were lots of rainforesty things to oggle, touch, hear and, unfortunately, smell. They were careful to place signs everywhere, explaining the residents of particular rainforest habitats as well as the plants that they live with and in. I loved it! I've never been up close to a poison dart frog before, and they're kinda cute behind glass.

After we left the rainforest, we decided to drive down to The Strand. Since J instantly fell asleep--and fell hard---we didn't get out and walk around. As far as I understand it, The Strand was the wealthy, bustling part of Galveston a century and a half ago. While it's undergoing a lot of obvious attempts at upgrading and renovations, you could tell that at one point what was a really pretty collection of buildings had become run down. It could be that one or two particularly bad storms hit the island and people just didn't want to rebuild. But it had a custom house like you'd see in an old port city along with other grand government buildings. Yet another thing to make me wish I had a better camera :)

Instead of seeking out more food in Galveston, we drove back to Kemah and had dinner at a barbecue place we passed up in favor of seafood. The brisket sandwich I had was great and so was the peach cobbler for dessert. Yes, NM was off the diet...some things are unavoidable. But the kids enjoyed dinner very much, even the intentionally bad karaoke :D

The boys did go to sleep more quickly than the night before, however. I told them 50 cents would go to the one who fell asleep first. ;)

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Houston Vacation: Day One

nobody@vox.com(Phisch) — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 10:55:38 -0500

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Originally uploaded by Phisch

Photos here.

First day, we had planned to visit NASA but instead opted for the Children's Museum and park areas instead. Turns out to have been a great plan.

The first stop was Houston's children's museum which both boys really enjoyed. When we first walked it, I could tell NM was apprehensive. After all, there were several buses full of little (K & 1st grade) kids. But after we wandered around the science and cultural exhibits, he changed his mind. Everyone had fun! The thing I enjoyed the most was watching the boys go nuts in the museum's "grocery." You load up your baskets with stuff from the store then take it to check out were you have to key in the prices yourself. There was only one (tired) guy to put all the things back on the shelves. I told the boys to put everything away and they didn't mind doing that.

Afterwards, we wandered around the Hermann Gardens which seems to be the city's version of a central park. There was a Japanese garden, a mirror pool with monuments at both ends, for Sam Houston and the city's pioneers, a little railroad (we rode), an amphitheater (under construction) lots of play areas, a man-made lake where you can rent paddle boats, fountains, an exhibition garden with sculptures (including one of Jose Rizal) and a lot of other stuff we didn't get to see. This is in the area that's close to the Rice University complex which is huge and very pretty. It looked like there was a lot of recent construction/reconstruction and improvements continue. We plan to go back.

After a day at the museum and the park, we headed off to Kemah Boardwalk where there are rides and restaurants. We didn't do the rides though we took photos (we'll go next time). The kids enjoyed walking around the boardwalk anyhow and we ate dinner at a place called The Flying Dutchman. Dinner was good for me, even if overpriced (tourist area, have to expect that). But, sadly, I learned that I am allergic to something on the broiled seafood platter. I had yellow rice pilaf, shrimp, scallops, red snapper and crab. I think it's the crab since I had everything else recently. How did I find out I was allergic? Around midnight, my back was burning and I thought maybe it's just hot. I realized that it was burning because I must have scratched in my sleep. Then the itch spread to my belly. It drove me nuts! I actually got up and had a super hot shower to get temporary relief after tossing and turning for over an hour. I had a serious case of the hives and it spread to my arms and legs the next day. Sad...I love crab!

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