our Second day - the trip to Pala Duro Canyon

 this way to the hole in the ground :)

Ok our second day of vacation we woke u at the Big Texan hotel, we went and ate breakfast at the restaurant where the night before we had dinner.. it was just across the parking lot and they even had a Horse Hotel for horses that they could shelter for the night.  So staying at the motel earned us a coupon good for $2 off breakfast .. so we went to eat and we saw one of the guys who had attempted to eat the 72 oz steak the night before .. he looked rough and we heard his friends say that he still had 52 oz of steak rolling around in his belly LOL.. anyway we ate a decent breakfast and headed out to our next stop .. the Pala Duro Canyon.. this is an unbeleivable sight .. who knew Texas had its own version of the grand canyon.. beatiful sights and we were able to drive down into the canyon .. it was a very awesome place.. lots of steep roads and curves .. it took us about 2 hours or so to drive through stopping to take pictures.  It was quite the experience ..kind of  a warm up to the final destination of the Grand Canyon..

We  saw some very cool mountain formaitions and even came across a cave.. one that Marie remembered going to when she was little with her Dad and Mom ... it also had little cabins you could rent that were built from old rocks each one had an ac and heater and from what we read bunk style beds.. may have to go again and rent one deep in the canyon.  Afer we drove through the canyon it was time to hit the road.. our next stop would take us to Albuquerque, New Mexico.  By the time we got to Albuquerque it was late and we decided to check in to a hotel - here we went for a dip in the Hot Tub and I went for a swim in the pool .. Marie was chicken to get in the pool as it was a little chilly.. so after a good swim and soak in the hot tub we called it a night so we could get up early and cruise around Albuquerque the next day..
stay tuned for Day 3 in Albuquerque..(god that is a long word to keep typing !!) 

A cabin you can rent at the park!!

Here you could go on a Jeep Tour through the Canyon.

finally home and now the wrap up

ok we are back home after a 3471 mile road trip.. we started in Spring and decided to go north to Amarillo, we left at around 10 30am and made it to Amarillo by 8:45pm and that was doing 80 all the way - we did one stop at Bucky's outside of Huntsville then a couple of stops for gas .. but when we made it to Amarillo we decided to go and check out the Big Texan Steak House. here they have the 72oz steak which if you can eat the whole meal.. including a salad , a roll. a shrimp coctail and a bake potato in an hour you get the meal free.. have you seen a 72 oz steak???  It was huge.. they had 3 try while we were there and they all FAILED lol.. the neat thing was that they have a live web cam above the table so you can always look and see anyone trying to beat the challenge and a webcam in front.. we were able to call our friends to jump on the webcam at http://www.bigtexan.com/  and they were able to see me and Marie as we were sitting in front of the table.   The place had a very cool hotel/motel that we were able to (as luck would have it) get the last room of the night. so we stayed there in a very cute room .. here are some pics of the hotel and some "different" people we ran into:

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all in all it was our first stop on our trip and a very cool evening.  a 32 oz beer and a good 10 oz prime rib steak rare as hell :) .. my babe had the fish dinner ,, we watched 3 guys try the meal and fail LOL.. maybe next time i can go ahead and try that half a cow dinner ...:)   so we crashed for the night and our next stop on our trip waited for us the next day ..

its almost time

well our bags are packed ..we're ready to go .. taxi's waiting he's blowing his ..

well you get the gist.. well be out a here tomorrow morning  picking up the convertable and going on a very .. long drive LOL .. we are staying in a teepee and maybe a haunted caboose .. we shall see.. anyway will be posting pics and updates when we leave and on the road.. looks like straight shot out I10 to El Paso.. ..