Texas - Part Two - Yup... still hot as heck!

We headed up the highway from Austin to Arlington for Six Flags Over Texas. The first park in the Six Flags "collection". We we're excited but were also dreading the heat and sticky mess the day would leave us in.

This is gonna be AMAZING!! Six Flags Over Texas, Arlington, Texas, USA

Arlington is a funny little spot nestled between Fort Worth and Dallas, where it houses a large overflow of stadiums and industrial parks that continue to grow and expand in Texas. Space isn't exactly at a premium here, where you can just build out instead of building up. Arlington is home to AT&T stadium, home of the NFL team, the Dallas Cowboys (boooo) and Globe Life Park, home of the baseball team, the Texas Rangers. It also is home to the American Chapter of MENSA, a large GM assembly plant and the International Bowling Campus (which I didn't even know was a thing...) This includes the American Bowling Congress (wait... what??), the International Bowling Museum and the International Bowling Hall of Fame... yes seriously. There. You learned something today. Well done.

Texas - Toasty ... Far too toasty

Taking the not-so-main highway through New Mexico, en route to Texas, was fairly rough. Like really bumpy. There was literally a line in the road when we crossed over into Texas and the road was instantly 1000 times better. So there's that...

The landscape through New Mexico and Texas was dotted with snake-like pipelines, refineries spurting their ever glowing flames, giant trucks taking oil to where ever, sad looking cows and dust. Lots of dust. The silhouette of the forever churning oil wells against the perfect blue sky just kept going until the horizon eventually gave way to the curvature of the earth and even then... the flat land kept going. I'm sure of it. It's everything I dreamed this part of the country could be. It was also really freaking hot! Which you'll find is a reoccurring theme from most of our trip, but Texas takes the cake. The 110°+ temperatures mixed with high humidity made things fairly miserable. It was so hot that the median on the interstate spontaneously burst into flames! I'm serious! Here's a picture!

Spontaneous fire in the median on the Interstate in Texas...

Six Flags - Magic Mountain

After cooking ourselves in Death Valley we decided to treat ourselves to a hotel during our visit to Six Flags Magic Mountain in Valencia, CA just outside Los Angeles. We spent two half days at the park and one full day, open to close.

Six Flags Magic Mountain has the world record for number of roller coasters in one park with a total of 19! This does not include other thrill rides but does include the less fun, kiddie coasters. Of the 19 coasters in the park we went on 15 of them. The other 4 were in the "kid zone" which we steered clear of. One of the great things about this park is that almost all the coasters are different styles from each other.

Six Flags Magic Mountain, Valencia, CA

From Mountain Passes to Season Passes

We got the call from the mechanic about the van while we were on a hike and out of cell service (of course) so we called back a bit later in the day wondering what the damage would be. Luckily it wasn't the fuel pump, or worse the engine. It was actually the Mass Air Flow sensor and was a relatively easy (and inexpensive) fix. Hooray!

Hiking at Silver Falls State Park, Silverton, Oregon - June 29th, 2016