My Nomadic Life

Life has been pretty rough. Right now as I write this I'm sitting in front of a fire in Colorado staring out at the mountains on a beautiful sunny day, with not a task to accomplish today. I know, I don't know how i'm surviving :)

A little less than a month ago Sean finally arrived in the US. I couldn't be happier and we are having a blast together. We spent a few days in Houston showing him my life there and a few new touristy things (Battleship USS Texas and NASA's Rocket Park). It was a gorgeous 80 degrees out for the week so it was fun to show him was a Texas "winter" was. I think I also accidentally made him think that all we do in Texas is eat.

We headed up to Dallas only a few days later to be caught in shorts and freezing temperatures. I guess he really did get to experience true Texas weather. We went to Billy Bob's with my sister for some live country music, two stepping, and bull riding. We were going to go to six flags the next day, but it didn't sound too pleasant in the freezing rain we were getting, so we staying inside and played games.

We spent the next few days shopping and packing for our next adventure and stopped off at a trampoline park. Sean LOVES his trampoline so I figured he would be missing it and it would be fun to see his moves. It wasn't exactly what we expected and there were a LOT of screaming children, but we had fun and Sean taught me how to do flips.

If we hadn't vacationed enough, my entire dad's side of the family headed down to Jamaica for thanksgiving and Sean tagged along. We had an absolute blast and the weather was beautiful. We did a bit of lounging by the pool and beach and headed out exploring one day. We went to a waterfall that is formed kind of like stairs. You can climb your way up to the top and it was a blast. Sean and my dad decided to take the hard way and try to climb up all the waterfalls instead of just stepping on the stones and Sean looked pretty abused by the end of it.

Though Sean is even less a fan of customs, he made it back into the US successfully where it was back to winter weather. We had a day to unpack, do laundry and repack and then headed on a road trip of the US. We headed to San Antonio the first day to stay with a friend of mine. We made a stop in Austin on the way to take a tour of the Capitol and were shocked to find the temperature had jumped to 90 degrees. We had only packed cold weather clothes, so we were a bit hot but we survived. We saw the Alamo and Riverwalk in San Antonio, and had an amazing dinner with my friend and his fiancee.

The next morning we headed out to Lost Maples Park. It was still beautiful weather out and the hike we did was gorgeous. We finished the hike, got back to our campsite and set up our tent, very conscience of the fact that we were the only tent among numerous RVs. Fortunately it was still hot out. Unfortunately overnight it dropped to 40 degrees and was quite chilly (more Texas crazy changing weather for Sean). Fortunately we weren't camping the next night, so we packed up our tent and headed out.

We drove the scenic route to New Braunfels and had lunch at the Gristmill. We stayed at my aunt and uncles house and my aunt took us on a driving tour of the city (it was still freezing out). That night we headed to Wassailfest, a local winter festival, but it was so cold we didn't stay too long. A huge ice/snow/wintery mix storm hit most of Texas that night, so we weren't able to leave as planned the next day. New Braunfels was fine, but Dallas was completely iced and closed. Our campsite for the night called to say they were closed too (but we had already decided the idea of camping in freezing rain was not our idea of fun). My uncle took us to Lockhart where the most famous BBQ in Texas is. I don't think Sean spoke the entire meal and just inhaled as much meat as possible. We took at stop to see the world's largest pecan on the way home (it was quite disappointing). Later we went the Gruene Hall (Texas's oldest dancehall) and came home and played some games with my aunt and uncle.

We decided to try and at least see as much as we could so we went to Fredericksburg for the next night. We stopped in Luckenbach (smallest town in Texas? US?), did a wine tasting at one of the area's million wineries and had dinner at a local German restaurant. We were going to try and go see Enchanted Rock the next morning when it warmed up a bit but Dallas was still frozen and was due to expect another ice storm. We decided we had to ditch our hike and get back to Dallas in the small window of time where it was slightly above freezing. Fortunately we had no trouble with the ice until we turned onto my parent's street.

Since Dallas was still mostly shut down we stayed home most of the next few days. My mom's side of the family came over to meet Sean and we spent the rest of the time doing laundry, watching TV, playing games and convincing Sean how atypical this weather was for Texas, especially this early in the year. I don't think he's convinced.

Two days ago we headed to Breckenridge, Colorado so Sean can go snowboarding. My sister and a friend of mine joined us. The weather is absolutely beautiful and there is plenty of snow on the ground for them. Because of my knee I can't go, hence me sitting at our condo by the fire. But I'm enjoying relaxing and they are enjoying having a ride to and from the slopes. We plan to do some snowshoeing at some point and walk around town a bit.

Once we get back from Colorado Sean heads home a few days later :(. I'm still on my last lesson of my homework, but I don't plan to start up again until I get to New Zealand. Time has flown and will continue to fly and while I'm loving the traveling unemployed lifestyle, I am looking forward to being somewhat settled again. I'm starting to get sick of packing and unpacking.

Well that's a lot so I'll stop there. I need to add some pictures, but I didn't bring my computer so you will have to wait for me to add them. In the meantime if we are facebook friends you can look at my pictures there.