It has taken me a bit longer to write this day's blog as I have been very busy since returning from South Texas. I got very little sleep the night before driving home and the driving last Sunday added to my tired condition.
Where to start? My intent for the second part of Road Trip #4 was to get up early today...Saturday...and drive over to the Victoria dealership and then hit Corpus Christi on the way back. I figured about 4 hours of driving plus the time spent in the dealerships...that would get me back to Kingsville in plenty of time to rest up for the football game...the purpose of my trip in the first place.
However, when I began to look at the map, I realized that the dealerships in McAllen and San Benito would require the same amount of driving...and I figured I would not be as close to them as I was right now. I could always make another business trip to Corpus before November 20th but there's no telling when I would be back to Kingsville...at least with time to drive to McAllen.
So it was decided...I would go to McAllen and San Benito. In order to be at the first dealership when they opened at 9am, I would leave the hotel at 7am. The alarm went off at 6:15am and I popped up and hit the shower. I grabbed a quick breakfast at the hotel and hit the road headed south on Hwy 77. My first stop was to be San Benito and then over to McAllen and back...one big loop...roughly 4 hours of driving.
The drive down to San Benito was pleasant enough...hardly any traffic. I watched the sun come up on my left about halfway there and enjoyed the solitude of the drive. As I approached San Benito, I noticed that I was about 45 minutes early...the computer is always a bit on the high side when it comes to time, but 45 minutes?!? I had another decision to make...find a place to eat a real breakfast and wait until the dealership opened or head over to McAllen and use the 45 minutes driving. I went for the latter.
I plugged the address of the dealership in McAllen into my GPS and headed in a more westerly direction...across country over some rather small farm-to-market roads. I also ended up going through a few small towns where the speed limit dropped significantly. However, I had a little extra time so no big deal. The drive through the poorer rural areas of South Texas was interesting. It's amazing how many yard sales and flea market-type set ups there were...nothing looked very interesting so I didn't stop, besides I was on a mission.
I did see one interesting site...a cane sugar processing plant. I saw smoke in the distance and as I got closer I discovered a rather large plant of some sort. I was almost past the plant before I saw the sign identifying it as a cane sugar processing plant. The city boy in me did not notice the sugar cane fields along the highway or I might have figured it out earlier.
At almost 9:00am on the dot I pulled up in front of the RGV Harley Davidson in McAllen. I did not realize what the "RGV" in the name stood for until I went inside...Rio Grande Valley...duh! There were already a few riders pulling up in front...probably buying something before going on a ride. The weather was great...perhaps some rain to the south. I did my thing and headed south to San Benito...the sister dealership of this one as it turned out.
This part of the valley...McAllen, Harlingen, San Benito and other cities...looks a lot like one of the metroplexes to the north...they all run together along the highway. I was in San Benito before I knew it, so much so that I overran it and had to make a u-turn. Once again, I got my passport stamped, looked around a little and hit the road back toward Kingsville via Hwy 77. The loop I thought I was going to take did not work out but it was all for the best...this way was faster.
As I drove I passed several palm-lined sections of the highway...and one mobile home park with hundreds of palm trees. The palm trees give the area a Florida feel...at least until you look beyond the trees to the surrounding area. However, the trees are a nice touch. Since it's obvious the trees are not native to South Texas, I wondered when they were first introduced and why did they pick palm trees. Well, perhaps one day I'll find out.
I was doing some mental gymnastics as I drove, evaluating the time I had before the game, what other activities I could do and most importantly, where was I going to eat lunch. I was getting hungry...I never stopped for a real breakfast...and it was not even noon yet so I decided to try Kings Inn, just outside Kingsville. If I could get in and out fairly quickly, there was still plenty of time to drive over to Corpus, get my passport stamped and still have time to take a short nap before reporting to the stadium by 5pm.
I did not have time to look up the location of Kings Inn in my GPS but I had seen a billboard advertising the place on my way out of Kingsville that morning. If I could find that billboard, I would just follow the road towards Baffin Bay and I would probably run into the place. I ate there a couple of years ago so I might recognize it when I saw it.
About the time I was ready to give up and drive into Corpus before eating...I was considering Joe's Crab Shack as a backup...I saw the billboard. I made my exit and headed south...or perhaps it is east. I get really mixed up in the Corpus/Kingsville area...nothing is in the direction I think it should be. Anyway, I was on a small two-lane farm-to-market road headed toward Baffin Bay and I knew the Kings Inn was right on the bay...and besides, there would be other signage.
On the road to the Kings Inn, I passed this little red chapel off the road a few hundred feet...seemed like it was out in the middle of nowhere but I'm sure it was a little town of a few people but I didn't see a sign anywhere. I watched my odometer click off the miles...5, 8, 10...and was about to turn around and go back to the highway when I noticed a parking lot through a break in the trees which looked familiar. I turned in and then saw the Kings Inn. The restaurant serves family style, which is the reason I had not been back by myself since that first time, but I figured I could order 1/2 orders and be alright. When the waitress came to the table, I noticed there were no menus. In fact, she gave me the choices verbally, which I quickly misunderstood...probably due to my hearing problems.
For example, I thought she asked me if I wanted "potato salad" before my meal...which I thought was a bit strange...and I said no thank you. As it turned out, what she must have asked me was did I want a "plate of salad" because I did not get a salad like the couple at the next table. Another example was when she gave me my options for the main course. The way she was grouping the items together it sounded like combos so I ordered the "fish and shrimp" combo...I even asked her if they were a combo and she said they were. She did warn me that the meat was served by the pound but that went in one ear and out the other. I ordered a 1/2 order of hush puppies and some french fries to round out the meal.
A few minutes later the food arrived...do you know what a pound of shrimp and a pound of fish looks like? Well, it is a lot of food. As I told Sharon later, there were only about 6 shrimps...that equaled a pound, so you can imagine how large they were. I eventually ate all the shrimp, about 2/3 of the fish, a couple of hush puppies and some fries and then waddled out to the car. Oh, the icing on the cake of my lunch was that it cost me my entire day's per diem...however, I doubted I was going to be hungry for some time.
Leaving the cafe, I realized that is was only a little past noon...I had at least 2 hours to get to Corpus and back and still have time to rest before going to the game at 5pm, so off I went. Good thing I opted for the Chevy Impala versus the Chevy Tahoe since I paid for the gas for the day of driving.
The drive to and from the Corpus dealership was uneventful and I made it back to the hotel by 2:30. I made sure all my clothes were ready, set my alarm for 4pm and then laid down for a short nap...another mini-road trip accomplished.
Next on the agenda is a drive through East Texas on my way to pick Sharon up at Little Rock National Airport. I'll leave home as early as 6:30am and head to Nacogdoches...the first stop.
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