Spontaneity at its Finest

Today my friend Miranda and I decided out of the blue to go to Fort Worth.

It was my last day of freedom before the descent of work and classes (the former of which will begin in promptly 10 hours), so we decided last night to get together and do fun things.  The plan was to meet at my apartment around noon, get lunch somewhere, and then go from there.

Waiting on the train...

So Miranda shows up around noon, with the suggestion that we take the train to Fort Worth for the day.  Since this was worlds better than any potential plan I had come up with, I enthusiastically agreed.  We started off with lunch at Rockfish, a seafood restaurant at Mockingbird Station in Dallas (fish and chips - yum!), and then took the DART train from there.  Things were going very smoothly until it came time to switch trains.  We got on the second train just fine, but soon discovered that that train wouldn't be departing for an hour.  We were at the end of the line, and the train doesn't run as often on the weekends.  So we hung out on the train, happy to be sitting in the air conditioning and figuring that this was similar to what we'd be doing anywhere else.  Eventually, the train pulled out, and about an hour later we arrived in Fort Worth.

Fort Worth Skyline

When we got off the train, it was already 4:30 - a little later in the day than either of us had anticipated our arrival time.  We consulted a timetable (as we probably should have done in the first place), and decided that the best train to take back to Dallas was the 8:21pm departure, giving us about 4 hours to wander the city.  I've been to Fort Worth exactly one time (last weekend, to go to the circus), but that was enough to give me a working knowledge of the city's layout.  I REALLY like Fort Worth - it's a very walkable downtown, and the architecture is beautiful, and it doesn't feel nearly as pretentious or vaguely dangerous as downtown Dallas.

Crawfish Etoufee!

Destination #1 was the Sid Richardson Museum, which featured a small gallery of Western paintings - cowboys and native americans and all that jazz.  It was all interesting and Texas-like.  After that we spent some time wandering Sundance Square and looking around random shops, mostly those involving Texas paraphernalia and hippie clothes/jewelry and whatnot.  Around 6:00 we decided we should start thinking about dinner - not because we were hungry, but because we wanted a good buffer before we had to catch the train.  So we chose a Cajun restaurant...and it was SO FUN and SO GOOD!!!  The inside was all colorful and Mardi Gras-tastic.  I had the Cajun Etoufee with Crawfish (after clarifying that the crawfish wouldn't come with heads on them), and it was absolutely delicious.  Then, even though we were both stuffed, Miranda and I split a Bread Pudding...which was sooooooooo tasty!  After we left the restaurant, we were both stuffed to the point of discomfort, but pleased with the deliciousness of our endeavor.  We ended the day by walking off our food babies (I named mine Bubba), and exploring the Fort Worth Water Gardens, a collection of unique and enormous fountains.  It was super cool!

Fountain at the Water Gardens

Finally, absolutely exhausted, we returned to the train station, and after waiting about half an hour, boarded our train for the ride home.  I timed the trip, and discovered that a well-planned train trip to Fort Worth from Dallas takes an hour and twenty minutes (not including sitting on a stationary train for an hour like our first journey).  That's a bit longer than it takes by car, but it's much more wallet-friendly and works out well when you're too exhausted and stuffed with etoufee to feel like driving back.

So that was my last day of freedom!  It was a day well spent, to be sure :)