For Spring Break this year we traveled to Dallas, Texas to visit Miranda and Zack.

We traveled from Ellijay, southwest to Mobile, Ala., and stopped for lunch and a swim in the ocean at Gulf Shores.

We went from there on up through Baton Rouge, La., where Hawk treated us to a huge sack of cajun boiled crawfish and shrimp from Mike's Seafood Market. We spent our first night in Alexandria, La., and the next morning we shot up to Shreveport, hung a left on I-20 and went straight to Dallas.

Miranda had a great Texas BBQ dinner ready for us that evening at their home. She and Branden, Zack, Hawk, Nick and I feasted and relaxed, Zack showed us some of his cool computer stuff.

The next evening we all rode over to Ft. Worth to the opening night of the rodeo at the Ft. Worth Stockyards.

None of us had ever been there, and we were surprised to find not only the rodeo, but an old timey city with cobblestone streets, tons of restaurants and shops and cowboy stuff everywhere.

There was a big NASCAR race in Dallas that weekend, and they had racecars on display.

The Stockyards were packed with people and we finally found an outside table at a restaurant called "Riscky's Catch."

We ate dinner and went on to the rodeo, where we saw the action, smelled the authentic rodeo smells, and bought souvenirs.

We hit the road the next day, taking I-20 all the way to Atlanta.

Here we are at a rest stop in Louisiana, and there are Hawk and Haus overlooking the mighty Mississippi River. (we didn't take a picture of the actual river. We were too brain-dead at that point to think of it!)

We finally made it home after a 4-day. 2,500 mile whirlwind southeastern tour.

All in all, a great vacation!