Riding the Rails

We just got home from a long weekend trip with Paw-Paw. Our friend Jenni recently rode the Amtrak from Austin to Ft. Worth and said it was great, so we were inspired to plan a trip around a railway adventure.

Paw-Paw came to Austin Friday afternoon and we departed Austin around 9:45 a.m. Saturday and arrived in Ft. Worth around 2:15 p.m. Yes, a longer trip than driving, but so much more fun! If you have a relaxed schedule, riding the train is the way to go. Super comfortable seats, plus a separate lounge car for hanging out - which is where we spent most of our time. We brought a picnic lunch and a few activities for Spence, including  "Train Tracking Games" that Dave created. (How many windmills can you find? How many of these animals do you see? etc.) There's a dining car too, but since we brought food we didn't visit it.

Ready to go on our adventure. It was SO HOT at the station Saturday morning.

Waiting in line to board.

Giving our tickets to the conductor.

Just before boarding.

Logging all the things we saw along the way.

The games Dave made were awesome.

Having lunch in the observation car.

A quick selfie from our seats.

Love this one of Spence and Paw-Paw

There's an Enterprise rental car place at the Ft. Worth station, so we picked up our vehicle and headed over to Grapevine Mills Mall. We explored the Sea Life Aquarium and then had dinner at the Rain Forest Cafe (which apparently I didn't get any pictures of?). That restaurant is so loud and crazy, it makes me question whether I'm cut out for Disney World one day... anyway, after dinner we let Spencer ride a little train around the inside of the mall. I have to admit, I held my breath when the train rounded the corner until I saw his smiling face return.

Spencer fish.

Shark tunnel.

Spencer and the sharks.

Riding the train inside the mall.

Next we checked into our hotel, which was a two-bedroom suite and perfect for our family getaway. Spencer started out in our bed each night and then we moved him to the sofa when we were ready for bed. Of course Paw-Paw had his own room.

Guests of the day - ha!

It was a very long day and Spencer was a champ - he's a fine little traveler. Just as he was almost asleep, we heard some popping noises outside. The nearby Gaylord Hotel does a fantastic fireworks show on the weekends, so we opened the curtains and enjoyed that. It was almost 10:00 p.m. before Spencer finally fell asleep, and the rest of us were not far behind.

The big activity for Sunday was LEGOLAND Discovery Center, also at the mall. This was the main reason our vacation took us to Grapevine and we were prepared to stay as long as Spencer wanted on Sunday. This place was great for his age - lots of activities and even 3 rides. It also has a 4D movie theater and we caught all 3 of the movies. We got a big kick out of the 4D experience (wind, rain and snow in the theater!).

Ready!

Being gangsta at the 4D theater

Getting an intro from Professor Brick-a-Brack

Daddy had as much fun as Spencer!

Mini-Land Rangers Stadium

Building cars to race.

I snapped a picture before our spin on the Merlin's Apprentice Ride

Spencer rode this 3 or 4 times - his favorite.

Of course when you leave LEGOLAND, you go through the gift shop on the way out. Paw-Paw was super generous and told Spencer he could pick out something for $50. Spencer was scoping out all the LEGO City sets. He found one that cost $50, but then an $80 set caught his eye. He said to Paw-Paw, "Hmmm...$80. Do you think you can handle that?" Paw-Paw smiled and said, "Yeah, I think I can handle that." But then Spencer put that one back and grabbed one that cost $20 and said, "Ohhhh, if I get this one and the $50 one, that'll be less. It'll be $70 instead of $80." Well, Paw-Paw couldn't argue with that, and said, "I guess I just saved $10." (Sidebar: I guess all that cash register play is paying off?)

After almost 6 hours at LEGOLAND, we caught the hotel shuttle back to our room. Spencer worked on the smaller kit and then we found a place to grab some dinner. We were all wiped out after our long day. Spencer wanted to do a little more on the small kit, before hitting the hay.

Just a little more...

We had considering squeezing in one more activity this morning before driving back to Austin (we did a one-way car rental - I had heard bad things about the return trip on the train being late a lot, so we opted to drive back for our maiden voyage), but decided we had done plenty. We stopped along the way for lunch and then Paw-Paw went back to Angleton shortly after we got home.

It was such a fun getaway. We are already scheming for our next train trip. Thank you Paw-Paw for a great weekend!