Spring Break Road Trip

Tyler has been on spring break this past week and we took a fun road trip to New Orleans with a quick stop in Houston on the way back. We ended up leaving Austin a day later than planned because Tyler had a stomach bug but he recovered and we had a great stay with Brad, Megan, Hazel, and Penelope in New Orleans. The trip back was a first for us because I-10 was closed in both directions at the Texas-Louisiana state line because of the flooding from the Sabine River. We took a several hour detour because all crossings of the Sabine River, which runs north-south and forms the border, were flooded for 70 miles. For comparison, we made it from Austin to New Orleans in 9 hours but it took us 8-1/2 hours to drive from New Orleans to Houston via the detour we took around the I-10 closure. We stayed one night in Houston at my dad's and then spent yesterday at the zoo with Bryce and his boys before driving back to Austin. The kids did pretty well in the car, mostly because of their tablets. They did ask us repeatedly where we were and how much longer. When we left Houston for Austin, Tyler asked us how long the drive would take. He actually responded, "That's not too bad" when we told him it was a 3-hour drive. More photos and blog entries to come...

 

The official I-10 detour takes drivers up I-49 all the way to Shreveport and then west on I-20. We were able to figure out that the north end of the Sabine River was passable because it is controlled by a dam at the south side of the Toledo Bend Reservoir. Kudos to Louisiana's 511 traveler information website (http://www.511la.org/) for accurate road conditions.