Leaving Big Bend National Park we had a long drive ahead of us. As it was a 10+ hour drive we thought it would be best to split it up into two days instead of trying to do a one monster night drive. Let me backtrack a little to tell you why we were making this huge drive to Houston instead of going to San Antonio, Austin or even Dallas first. We have great friends in Houston (Sam & Brian) that we really wanted to see. Sam was due to give birth around March 6 and so our options were to go to Houston prior or a few weeks after. We were not sure if we would still be in Texas in mid-March so we opted to go prior to the baby showing up and drive all the way from Big Bend to Houston.
The drive over was pretty neat in itself. Since we had started this portion of the trip after leaving San Diego we had been driving through the desert. Southern California, Arizona, New Mexico, West Texas; all were deserts. For the most part today’s drive was desert as well. Right at the end though, we were about an hour outside of San Antonio when we pulled off the highway for the night to our campground and pulled in. We were under trees! It might sound strange but it’s an experience that we had not had for the most part in two months.
The next day we set off for Houston. As is customary for us we took the back roads and found ourselves in the Hill Country area of central Texas. I had not been back to this area since my bachelor party two years prior and was excited to see it again. To both of us it was almost immediately the most beautiful area of Texas and it made for a beautiful drive. From our campground in Kerrville we made it through Fredericksburg (stopping at a winery on the way of course) before making our way to Austin by way of route 290. We had already made plans to visit the Hill Country in a few weeks after Houston so it was pretty exciting for us to get a preview of what we would be seeing. Soon enough though the sprawl of Houston started and within a few short hours we were pulling up to Sam & Brian’s.
After saying our hellos and catching up for a while we headed out for dinner. Houston we were told is a food town. People like to eat and they eat well. On the menu for tonight was Hughie’s Heights. This was a Vietnamese restaurant inside a craft beer bar. This sounded like an awesome mash up for us and we were off. We arrived and were greeted by Sam & Brian’s friends Lauren & Brent who joined us. We ordered beers, food & life was good. After dinner we drove over to their local brewery, Town & City Brewing. (Also don’t worry we were not driving. Sam was very nice by driving Julie and the 2 Br(i/y)ans to these establishments). The beer was excellent at Town & City. It was a perfect way to end the day.
The next two days were big days. We were told that when people move to Houston they tend to gain the “Houston 40”. This is due to the amazing good and diverse food that is available in the city. Today we got to experience our first crawfish boil. After relaxing in the morning we ventured with Sam & Brian to the Crawfish Café. Here you order your crawfish sauced in either the standard Cajun spices or a variety of Thai or other Asian spices. We both got the standard Cajun and dug in. This was a little difficult as you wear plastic gloves so that the sauce doesn’t stain your hands as you crack open the little lobsters. For being a little difficult for a newbie to open they sure were delicious. After lunch we headed over to the Beer Can House. The Beer Can house is a small house in west Houston that not including the roof is completely covered in aluminum from beer cans. This was done from the 1960’s through the 80’s. It was pretty interesting that the owner had so much free time on his hands that he decided to cover his entire house in beer cans that he drank. From the Beer Can house we took a little break before going to dinner at one of Sam & Brian’s favorite Mexican restaurants. After dinner was the real show. We drove to central Houston to Sigma Brewing to go see Doomsday Wrestling: The Era of Sexy that was taking place at the brewery. This was an amazing show! This wrestling show was comedy wrestling. While they did actual wrestling (just like in WWE), the actor’s costumes and plot lines were hilarious. To put the icing on the cake one of Sam’s friends was one of the wrestlers. It was an overall great day!
The next day we woke up ready for another fun packed day. As it was Sunday we headed out for brunch in the morning. After brunch we headed back to Sam & Brian’s for a bit of rest. From there we headed to Karbach Brewery for a music fest that they were putting on. One of Julie and my favorite musicians is Bob Schneider. He doesn’t travel too often outside of Texas but as we were in the state and he was performing in Houston we knew we had to go. The festival was a country music fest but as Bob plays a variety of styles it wasn’t too out of place for him to be performing there. As he had the 4-5pm spot timing worked out perfectly for us for having brunch, getting a little rest and catching Bob’s show. He played great as expected and the 4 of us had a great time seeing him play. From the show & brewery we went back to Sam & Brian’s then Julie & I hopped into Bubbles and hit the road. We were heading a little south of Houston to meet up with Julie’s family friends Craig & Tami and their kids. After meeting them at their house and seeing photos of Julie’s and Craig’s mom’s growing up together we went out to dinner together at a BBQ joint called Pappa’s. We had a great meal and as Craig works at NASA made plans for the next day to tour the facility with him.
The next morning we woke up bright and early and headed down to Craig’s house. Once there we hopped in his car and headed over to the Johnson Space Center. Craig works with a team that designs exercise equipment that astronauts use in the International Space Station. First stop for the day was the launch control room used during the Apollo missions. It was really neat to see up close how the control room used to look and how they communicated with astronauts through all the famous Apollo program missions. From there we walked to the current mission control room and saw from a viewing area the current mission room. It was pretty neat seeing people in Houston watching over the space station and seeing live feeds from the inside and outside of the space station. From there we drove over to a building that housed a replica of the current space station. It was pretty neat to see how large (or small depending on your perspective) the space station actually is. The space station is made up of modules each being sent up one by one and added on as it arrived. It was really a cool thing to see in person.
One of the neatest parts of the day was to see exercise machines that Craig’s team was currently working on. Exercising in space is a hard concept to grasp. As Craig put it “How do you lift weights in space when all items weigh nothing at all?” We learned that resistance bands as well as other methods to force resistance in space do a lot of it but that is just scratching the surface of how difficult it is to design, test and ship up an exercise machine to the space station. We also learned that exercise is very important to astronauts in space. If they do not exercise their bones become brittle which would become a very big health issue back on earth. It’s such a big issue that if astronauts are not able to exercise and the machine cannot be repaired within 30 days the astronauts mission is cut short and they must immediately return to earth to not jeopardize their health. From Craig’s office we drove to the front of the complex and toured an early rocket used to send astronauts in space and took pictures of the space center sign. After driving back to Craig’s house and saying our thank you’s and goodbye’s to Craig we drove back to Sam & Brian’s for a great home cooked meal that they had prepared before going to bed. It was a super fun day at NASA!
The next day, our last in Houston was spent preparing to hit the road again. Grocery shopping was done, clothes were washed and inside Bubbles was cleaned. As a thank you to Sam & Brian for letting us stay with them we cooked dinner and shared a toast as we had 5 great days in Houston with them.
Thanks again Sam & Brian and Craig & Tami for being such awesome friends, showing us around your town and letting us invade your homes for a few days!
Next up….We explore the Texas Gulf Coast!
