Welcome to Texas

For the conclusion of our adventures together this semester Jenn and I decided to take another trip to Texas. You may ask yourself "Didn't you already spend way to much time in Texas?"

Really, the answer is YES! Our time in Texas before was so long. There were times when I thought we had stumbled into some sort of Groundhog Day sequel with rednecks and fast food. However, we had heard great things about Houston and wanted to give it a shot. Our first stop was Galveston. After our experience in Florida we really wanted to go back to the beach. 

We realized on our way that the GPS was telling us to take a ferry to get to there. Neither of us had ever been on a ferry so we were pretty excited and actually it ended up being one of the highlights of the trip. We got out and went to the front of the boat. Almost immediately, a nice Texan named Lori approached us and started chatting. She welcomed us to Texas and told us about the area a little. Then she pointed out a dolphin swimming around just a ways from the ferry. We thought that was so cool! As we pulled away and started our journey toward Galveston we started seeing them all over. They were so playful, jumping out of the water and swimming around together. Lori told us that when she lived close by she was able to see them every morning from her house. Jenn and I both thought that was awesome. 

 Unfortunately it is hard to get them to pose for pictures. This is the best we could do.

 Even though the beaches were not quite as nice as those in Pensacola, we had a lot of fun. There were fish swimming around us, and some really big waves. The weather was beautiful and the water was really nice. We didn't want to leave!

Jenn's dream home...

 We stopped for lunch at Wendy's and this was the view from our table...I am falling in love with the ocean and the beach. 

While in Houston we stopped the visitors center. I really wanted to buy this buckle for my friend Jared Oldham. He loves Texas so much. I really wish he could have been there to enjoy it with us. We toured the town a little and did a some shopping (we seem to do a lot of that when we travel). We really liked Houston. It was clean and had tons of things to do (none of which we had time to actually do). 

The next week flew by and before I knew it Jenn was on a plane back to Utah. I am glad that she is safe and with family. I worry about her a lot less now that she is home...although it doesn't seem to make it any easier to be away from her. 2 weeks down...4 to go. 

The frog and the worm

Thanks to the Smithsonian Institute's free museum day, we had one of our busiest days yet. Its a good thing we have had so much practice as "speed tourists."

Our first stop was the Oak Alley Plantation in Vacherie, LA. We got there bright at early and were the first visitors of the day. It was raining pretty hard but luckily we had our umbrellas. A very nice tour guide (senior at the local high school) gave us a tour of the planation house. 

Although the house was nice, really the grounds were the best part. It was a beautiful place. The 200 year old oak trees were awesome and the best part...I caught a frog!!!!!! It was so cute. I tried to think of a way to take it home with me but I didn't think it would survive all day in my pocket. 

Jenn finally got her Mardi Gas mask. 

Our next stop was the National WWII museum in New Orleans. It was a great museum and really helped put in perspective the sacrifices made during the war. It focused mostly on D-day but had a holocaust exhibit a few other great exhibits (we didn't take any pictures though). 

For our last stop, we walked down to Canal St. to the Audubon Insectarium. It was fun but mostly geared towards small children. I found myself wishing I was 3 ft tall. While we were there we both ate cinnamon crunch flavored grub worms... delicious. The only problem was that it was sort of gritty and I felt like it was stuck in my teeth the rest of the day! Yuck!!!!

Gators, Gators, and More Gators

Some of the things we have liked best (and sometimes least) about Louisiana are the outdoors and wildlife. I joke with some of the people I work with that they don't even need a zoo here because all they have to do is walk outside. Just in our little pond behind our apt we have frogs, turtles, 10 different types of birds, fish, and nutria (which is a rat/beaver thing that came from South America to take over the south for those that didn't know). We decided to make another trip to the bayou to look for alligators, and whatever else we could find.

Just south of New Orleans lies the Barataria Wildlife Preserve inside the Jean Lafitte Preserve. The preserve is made up of tons of rivers, canals, and bayou.

There is tons of Spanish moss dangling from most of the trees. It makes it a little eerie but really pretty. I wouldn't want to be stuck there at night! Also, It was nice because most of the trails were raised so we could walk right over the water and get really close to the wildlife.

This guy was hanging right over the trail. He was probably 3 inches long. I am still having nightmares from that.

We got to see quite a few alligators on our walk. Most of them were right off the trail. It made me wish I had a bag of marshmallows.

We also saw a few turtles, salamanders, and this little guy. I am determined to catch one of these before I leave. They are so cute.

We saw this guy just as we left the preserve. It is awesome how many alligators there are here. If I wasn't so scared of getting my arm ripped off, I would try and take one of them home too.

I'm goin' to the zoo, zoo, zoo...

Adam is working kind of a weird schedule where he gets every other Friday off, so last weekend we decided to visit the zoo. It was honestly one of the best zoos we have ever been too. Most of the animals were in open enclosures without glass, so we could see all the animals really well. Plus, they were so close to us!

They also had a petting zoo, and we got a kick watching little kids run away from the goats.

My favorite exhibit was the orangutans. They had this little baby one that was so cute! I could've just sat there and watched it for hours.

Adam loved the turtles. The enclosures are set up so most of them had water between us and the animals, and I'm pretty sure Adam was more interested in finding turtles in the water than looking at the animals in the exhibit.

In order to get his attention, I decided to try on a little disguise. I think it worked!

They had a bunch of gators, but it's a lot more fun to see them in the wild. They get so fat at the zoo!

We mostly loved this zoo because the animals were so active. We totally watched these two go at each other and it was crazy. I thought the poor wildebeest in there was going to have a heart attack.

On Saturday, we took a little trip to Pensacola Beach. After seeing what the Louisiana shore looks like, we thought it might be nice to go to a real beach.

Adam had never been swimming in the ocean before, and he loved it! It was a gorgeous beach with white sand and really clear water. We even saw a jellyfish!

It was also really nice because the water was shallow, so we could go pretty far out and still reach. Actually, we had a hard time even finding water deep enough to reach Adam's shoulders!

Also, I thought I'd add this picture on for you baby bump watchers. This is me at 29 weeks!

NOLA

We started off our first day in New Orleans with a stop at Cafe du Monde. Apparently it is THE place to get beignets, and we were very pleased. We will definitely be getting some more of those before we leave.

After breakfast we took a little tour of the French Quarter. I really love the architecture there and all the buildings are so cute! There a lots of cute colors and they all have sweet balconies.

If the city wasn't so dirty, I would totally consider living in one of these apartments.

After wandering around, we went over to the French Market which is so fun to walk through. Unfortunately I didn't get a picture, but it's basically a bunch of vendors selling venetian masks, gator heads, and other local souvenir-type stuff.

One of our first weekends here was Decadence, which is some sort of gay pride festival. Anyway, they put these all over the sidewalks and I thought they were hilarious so I just had to put it on here.

After our little tour of the French Quarter, we walked over to the aquarium to meet some friends. We had a hard time finding somewhere to sit because there were lots of nice guys like this taking up the benches.

They have a sweet package where you can go to the aquarium, zoo, insectarium, and imax for only $19 which is a killer deal, so after the aquarium we went over the imax and finally saw the new Batman movie (and loved it of course!). We were pretty tired by the time we got home from our busy day, but we had a lot of fun exploring the city!