Cypress Valley Canopy Tour

After trying to reformat this stupid thing for 30 minutes, I give up. The pictures and text are kind of messed up but you get the point.

This is a long one but well worth the read.

Two months ago I began planning a trip for about 20 people to go on a Canopy Tour in Austin, about 3 hours away. I booked the hotel, reserved the canopy tour, and basically created a whole itinerary for the weekend.

Friday I went to work like normal because we didn't want to have to take anytime off work. On my lunch break I went to The Bass Pro shop to get a hitch mounted cargo carrier. I borrowed my Mom's car for the trip since there were going to be 6 driving down in one car. I called Dylan because he had my Mom's car for the day, and asked him if he could measure the hitch to find out what size the connector was. It was either a 2" or 1-1/4". He said it was 2". After I bought the 2" carrier, I called him back, just to be doubly sure. I asked him to measure it with a ruler, since he was in the office, he again replied with 2". I was confidant that he knew what he was talking about.

We are to meet everyone at my friends house at 5:30. We decided to order pizza and wait out the traffic. I got home from work, finished packing and asked Dylan to put together the carrier.

Around 5:30 we were ready to go. We just needed to drop off Carmen at the dog sitters and we were on our way. "Put the hitch on just to be sure it fits." As I watched him pick up the carrier and try to fit it in the whole, I immediately realized, "IT DOESN'T FIT." Here I go, "You had 1 simple thing to do today, measure the hitch connection and you couldn't do that???" Needless to say he knew he screwed up big time. We were supposed to be there by now and we still needed to drop off the dog AND we now needed to find an adaptor because we have 6 people riding in a car and the 2 coolers and 6 bags will not fit in that car, unless we get this connector. Dylan drops me off at Wal-mart so I can see if they have an adaptor. He then runs to drop off Carmen. I finish what I needed to do and tell him I'm out front. He pulls up and Carmen is still in the car. I calmly look at him (ok, maybe not so calmly) and ask, "WHY THE HELL IS CARMEN STILL IN THE CAR???" He proceeds to tell me that Anna, the dog sitter is not home. Again, he had such simple tasks this week. I plan a trip for 20 people, and he can't measure a hitch connector or make sure the dog sitter is home???

Finally, around 8pm, we pull up to my friends while everyone is looking at us like we are about to be hung on a cross. Dylan took full blame and let everyone know that it was all his fault. Which it clearly was.

So, with all that over with, we are on the road and our trip starts. For those of you that think I flipped out on Dylan, I just want you to know that I didn't. I was very calm and tried to keep it together. I just kept thinking, there are so many other worse things in life to worry about, so I just let it all go. I really did. I was quite proud of myself.

We get to Austin pretty late so we decide to just hang out for a couple hours then head to bed cause

we have a very exciting and long day ahead of us.

Saturday morning...We got to the Canopy Tour place on time and we were all ready to go. There is a lot to be said for 21 people all being ready and on time ANYWHERE. We split up in groups of 7 and were on our way. We had so much fun. We were connected to zip lines and we learned about ecology and did a challenge, like walking a tight rope and all kinds of stuff. It really is unexplainable. We all just had the best time. The weather turned out perfect. We were there from 10:30 in the morning to 5 in the afternoon.

We were all pretty spent after that but our day wasn't over yet, we had dinner reservations at Salt Licks, it's this famous BBQ restaurant that has a live band and a great atmosphere. After dinner we were all going to head back to the hotel and get ready to go out on the town.

After our long day at the Canopy Tour, huge delicious dinner, and a drink or two, only 10 of us made it out later that night. I hadn't been to Austin in about 7 years so I wasn't missing out for anything. Dylan wimped out and stayed at the hotel but I went out. We called 3 cabs and met up on 6th street.

If you are ever in Austin, the canopy tour really is something you should try and Salt Licks shouldn't be passed up either. All-in-all it was a great weekend. There was no drama, everyone got along and seemed to have just as much fun as Dylan and I.

The family that runs the canopy tour were so nice and the guides were unbelievable. They emailed me on Sunday afternoon and told me they were sending me 2 gift certificates and a t-shirt to thank me for setting up such a large group of great people. Can you believe that! This trip seriously compares to one of the best trips I've ever had, its right up there with skydiving.

Sunday night Dylan had 2 back to back flag football games. They won the first but lost the second. He scored 3 touch downs though. I didn't go this week because the house needed some major tending too, and I may have snuck in a nap here and there.

I took my car into the shop Monday night and on the way back, Dylan and I drove by the old house. It was my first time since the day my Dad moved. It was sad, but it looked just the same so I can just tell myself that someone I know still lives there.

I hope everyone had just as great of a weekend as we did!!!

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