Today is one of my best friends birthday and I am currenty in Austin helping him celebrate! My girlfriend and a friend of ours left town last around 6:30pm because I couldn't get off work earlier. Normally when we drive to Austin we take 287 down to Fort Worth, then continue on 35 all the way to central Texas. Usually the trip is around eight to eight and a half hours long. I'm not sure why we usually take that way, maybe because there's a part of me that misses the DFW area. Yesterday, my friend told me a way to Austin that he had discovered to save time, going South on 84 almost to Sweetwater, then taking 70 to 183.
We ended up making the whole drive in seven hours and fifteen minutes. This was great becase we worried that since we couldn't leave till 6:30pm, that it would be 3am before we arrived. The best part about the drive, especially at night, is the miles and miles of windfarming that is happening around Sweetwater. Rows and rows of simultaneously blinking lights, one on top of every wind propeller. As far as you can see, blinking red lights. Maybe it's the computer geek in me that wants to know things like how they program the lights to blink at the same time, and what equipment does it take to keep them running and maintained? I guess I could find all this out by talking with one of AC's many Wind Farm students!
Today will be filled with movies, food, and just general catching up with old friends. I'm excited to be in Austin and getting to see people and things that are not normally seen in Amarillo. Hot dog stands run out of Airstreams, delicious grocers like Whole Foods, and a city treeming with college life that is just not apparent in our small West Texas city.
-MH
We ended up making the whole drive in seven hours and fifteen minutes. This was great becase we worried that since we couldn't leave till 6:30pm, that it would be 3am before we arrived. The best part about the drive, especially at night, is the miles and miles of windfarming that is happening around Sweetwater. Rows and rows of simultaneously blinking lights, one on top of every wind propeller. As far as you can see, blinking red lights. Maybe it's the computer geek in me that wants to know things like how they program the lights to blink at the same time, and what equipment does it take to keep them running and maintained? I guess I could find all this out by talking with one of AC's many Wind Farm students!
Today will be filled with movies, food, and just general catching up with old friends. I'm excited to be in Austin and getting to see people and things that are not normally seen in Amarillo. Hot dog stands run out of Airstreams, delicious grocers like Whole Foods, and a city treeming with college life that is just not apparent in our small West Texas city.
-MH
How can we bring some of that Austin excitement to Amarillo?
Try some Round Rock donuts while in Austin. They are awesome!!!!
I've always wondered about those blinking red lights around Sweetwater. If you go through at night it's so eerie. Miles and miles of red lights all blinking in unison. During the day it's just amazing to see, GIANT windmills for miles, it's almost soothing the way they all move so slow and steady. I didn't know AC had a wind farming program. That's really cool, I guess that means windfarming will be moving into the Panhandle soon?
Bringing some Austin excitement to Amarillo would definitely involve change, and we all know how Amarillo disagrees with change. EX: Krispy Kreme doughnuts anyone?