Friday, April 17, 2009

Louisiana Part 1

Julia Grace in the car after eating at the Cracker Barrel in Montgomery, Alabama.
Julia Grace thinks Cracker Barrel is all kinds of "NUMMY!" I agree!
A bridge before Mobile, Alabama. Lots of waterways and then a huge bridge - don't remember anything else about it now! I was driving at this point.
The view from the center of the big bridge - It was overcast so it's hazy looking but we were pretty high up there!

The sun is setting somewhere on Interstate 10 in Mississippi - this is pre-car fiasco with truck tire.

Getting there...

We left on Sunday morning about 9 a.m. from Boiling Springs for the long drive to Lafayette, Louisiana to visit Tracy's brother Philip and take him his car that was here and not there. It was me, Tracy, Julia Grace and Tracy's mom, Cathy. Mallory had to go back to school from Spring Break or we would gladly have taken her with us too. She made Philip a sweet card though for us to give him since she wouldn't get to see him.

We stopped in Montgomery, Alabama to eat at the Cracker Barrel just off the interstate. Food was great as usual but the service from our waitress was just lousy. In fact another waitress noticed we needed things and brought them to us. Tracy looked for her afterwards to give her a tip and she hugged him and I swear I thought the lady might cry telling him he was so sweet for doing that. We got Julia Grace a really cute dress that was on clearance there for her to wear this spring and I'm hoping to have some photos made in it.

Tracy was driving Philip's car and Cathy was following us - Overall the trip down was okay until Gulfport, Mississippi. Tracy swerved and dodged a piece of truck tire in the road but Cathy couldn't miss it. Her check engine light came on immediately and we stopped. They called OnStar who told them it was emissions issue and just make sure to take it to a dealership within 7 days. Holy cow. Yeah we drove the rest of the way to Lafayette. Cathy had her Vue checked out at a dealership there on Monday and it turns out we shouldn't have driven it after all because it could have caught on fire at any moment. Nice. Not so sure we should trust the OnStar folks henceforth. Needless to say this prolonged our stay in Lousiana by almost 2 days getting it fixed since there is no Saturn dealership there.

We did get there in one piece and checked into the hotel. Then we went over to Philip's apartment at a little before midnight. We had Taco Bell for dinner and Julia Grace ran in circles in his apartment squealing and laughing and hiding from Philip. She sure does like her Uncle Philip! My camera was at the hotel and I didn't get a single picture. We finally got back to the hotel around 1 or 2 something - which was central time there meaning 2 or 3 our time. I don't think anyone moved an inch once the lights were out at the hotel!

0 comments: