The trip there was fantasticly entertaining. We laughed and joked the whole way there, especially through Leakey, which we thought would be a terrible place to live with a name like that. And we wondered how the town got that name. (Apparently it was named in honor of John Leakey. Well, alrighty then) Also, Real County was hilarious, just because of the name as well. (Which is also named after a guy with the last name: Julius Real.)
We arrived in Del Rio an hour ahead of schedule, which was fantastic for us. We explored the town for a tiny bit before I went back and took my test. I had 5 hours to take it, and I completed all 104 questions (100 were multiple choice, 4 were written answer) in about 2.5 hours. I feel rather good about it all; however, I won't know about my results until July 7th. Such a long time to wait! Oh well, no biggie.
Oh, we even got to go through a Border Patrol station on the way back. We thought it was going to be harder than it was. They simply asked if we were American Citizens and waved us through. They had a beautiful Black German Shepherd there. Pretty pup!
Well, that's were all the fun pretty much stops. We gassed up and were on the other side of Uvalde, closer to Concan, when we got a flat. We figured we could get to the next gas station on it, no biggie. Well... That's not true. We got a true flat that lead us to pulling over on the side of the road. Okay, no worries. We got this. Pulled out the doughnut and panicked a bit. There was no jack and there was no cell service. Great... It took us 30+ minutes to flag someone down. Finally, an older couple pulled over and a gentleman about our age turned around and stopped, both giving us assistance. The older couple let us borrow their jack and the guy let us borrow his lug wrench. Okay, fantastic. Now we have to figure out what to do on this doughnut, which isn't supposed to get us very far or anywhere very fast.
It's almost 9 pm and we've barely made it the edge of Concan. Breathe and use the GPS to find and call repair shops. Everything in Leakey is closed and everyone we called in Uvalde blew us off. Called one place who gave us a number for another place who just basically said a nice big "F-YOU". Well, okay, fine. We'll call the parents, and ask them what we should do. They tell us to get a room for the night and find a mechanic in the morning. Got it; we're headed to Leakey for the night then.
So, Leakey... Funny town before, pain in our butts now. Of the two inns/motels/whatever you wanna call 'em, both are full. There is 400+ people in this town due to the beginning of summer and there is no place for us to stay. FANTASTIC! It's almost 11 pm and we're exhausted and hungry and tired of being in the car. But we can't stay here, so we decide to push our luck on the doughnut and head to Junction, 60 miles from Leakey.
Do you know how slow 25 miles per hour is at night on a road that is supposed to be 70-75? Other vehicles passed us and it was like they were going the speed of light! Ugh... The GPS is trying to tell us that our destination (a Days Inn on the outskirts of Junction, where we hope to spend the night) is only 30 minutes away. Oh, silly GPS, don't you know we can't go that fast?
25 mph and 2 hours later, we finally arrive at the Days Inn at 1 in the morning and we're more than exhausted and starving, yet not hungry at all. We paid $100+ to sleep about 7 hours. Whatever, I don't really care (Father-in-Law had graciously given us his card in order to fill up with gas, so we used that to pay for everything we need. Thank the Lord that we had that card, or else we would have slept in the car), we're tired and we need sleep. We've been up since 7 am to make sure we arrived on time with meal times and gas stops and all that. Tired, bed time.
8 am the morning of the 14th, we puttered 3 miles down to an auto shop (which, apparently, was open 24/7, but we didn't know that, but neither did the guy at the desk who directed us there. No biggie.). We got the tired fixed and he even aired up the doughnut for us, letting us grab breakfast and drive the hour home. So freakin' tired, we took naps that day and went to bed early even.
So, the moral of all that, I suppose, is make sure you're well equipped to take extended journeys (such as making sure you have everything you need for a flat) and that I don't want to make any more journeys this month. Oh brother, I am so tired of sitting in a car for long periods of time.
Off to crochet my butt off now. If you're interested in checking all that out, check out Kota's Crochet Creations for more information. I have lots of stuff posted there!
