Trip to Dallas part two
Trip Start
Sep 09, 2005
1
77
151
Trip End
Ongoing
Dallas, Texas
Tuesday, May 2, 2006
I climb on the bus to head to the rental car lot. For those of you who are not familiar with the Dallas airport and rental car arrangement, let me describe the set up.
You board a bus at the terminal that takes you to this massive rental car facility. All rental car companies are at one place. It seems like it is about 20 miles away from the airport (at least) while in reality I think it is 5 miles. It is a really huge place. I find Avis and head out to the car. I look at the space number. D32. I know I am in trouble. It never, ever, never ever fails that my car is always parked the furthest away from the building. I am not kidding. I usually have to walk past dozens of empty spaces to get to my car. I wonder why they do this? Do the employees all gather by the door to watch us poor schmucks drag our sorry butts the entire length of the parking lot to get to our car? I bet they do and they are laughing! I actually took a picture of this. I know, my life is sometimes pathetically boring!
So, I get in the car and head out of the lot. It turns out, this was the only correct turn I made during the next 4 hours for a 37 mile trip! My first wrong turn was out of the lot. Wrong way, turn around. Then I have another choice. North or south on 121. I was supposed to go north, so guess which way I went. 121 is a limited access road, so I was stuck on it. I found an exit which I scoped out and it looked like I might be able to get back on in the other direction, but all of a sudden there were all these options! Fortunately, a Parking Spot bus pulled out in front of me, so I figured it was probably going to the airport, so I stuck close to the bumper and followed it. Fortunately I was correct and we headed back to the airport.
I passesd the airport heading NORTH! This is what I wanted. I was to stay on 121 until I came to McKinney. I was armed with mapquest and directions to my hotel so I thought I was set. NOT. Already I had driven 25 miles to travel 5 in the right direction. So, onward I go.
121 is under construction. It has been under construction for 6 years, ever since I started coming here. It has progressed somewhat, but it still looks like a disaster. It sends you to the left, then to the right, then you have to go around and back onto the road. Sometimes you actually have to exit off the road to the left, go under it and get back on it from the right. There are stop lights and a lot of traffic. I make it to where the map says to exit to head to the hotel. I am heading south on 75. McKinney is north on 75. Of course! I find an exit and turn around and head back. I see the road I used to exit onto, and turn. It looks all wrong. The roads are changed. I can't go where I thought I should. I turn around and head back, except I can't find the way to continue to go north. I go south. I want to go north. I find an exit, get off and head north again. I go past where I thought I was supposed to go. I try the next exit. You guessed it, the same thing happens.
By now I am really used to getting off and getting back on. Ok, I decide just to stay on 75. This is not right. I exit. I head south. I get back off onto the first street I used. Everything is different than before. I begin to get a sense of direction and weave my way through some back roads. I see the McKinney water tower. I set my sights on it and head in it's direction. I wind around here and there for about another half hour. I see a McDonalds and pull in to get a soda and ask directions. The first worker doesn't know where the Holiday Inn is. I am not sure she knew what a Holiday Inn was.
I pull forward and ask the next person where the Holiday Inn is. He said he thought it was up the road a bit, but wasn't sure, but there was some hotel there. I told him I might be back for dinner if I didn't have any luck. I had been driving for about 3 1/2 hours now. I turned out of the parking lot and didn't drive any further than 40 feet when I saw the wonder Holiday Inn sign!!!!! Yippee!
