Fort Worth, Texas

Wednesday, April 29  Day 22

We arrived in Bedford Texas about 5:30 last night and were invited to dinner at our hosts house. How nice is that? Ilse served a wonderful spaghetti dinner. Her daughter and partner also attended who both work for American airlines. It was very interesting evening hearing of travel experiences, daughter Eurina's trip to Nepal right before the earthquake. We checked out Tripadvisor for both Dallas and Fort Worth and our hosts suggested Fort Worth. We were happy they did as it is a lovely city and not too crowded. After finding parking, we went to see the Fort Worth Water Gardens. It is a lovely serene area, in the midst of high rises designed architecturally as a gift for the city of Fort Worth, The 3 main features areas including a meditation  pool, an active pool, and an aerated pool.

Active pool

Meditation pool

No one is allowed to swim or wade as 4 people drowned in one of the pools. Our host said they were doing something foolish when it happened. We walked down to Sundance Square where there is a lovely mural depicting the historical Fort Worth being the start of the huge cattle drives along the Chisholm trail.

 There is an old fire station that houses a museum that explains the history of Fort Worth.We had a quick lunch and went to see the hotel where Kennedy spent his last night before being assassinated in Dallas. There were photographs that were taken there of Kennedy, Jackie and LBJ. 

Note the Where the West Begins on the sign.  See below.

We headed to the historic Stockyards of Fort Worth which are a very touristy area but fun to see. They have a cattledrive down the center of the street twice a day but sadly,we missed it.

There is apparently a lot of competition and no love lost between Fort Worth and Dallas.  There is a famous quote describing Ft Worth, "Where the West Begins" According to the Fort Worth governmental website, it began as such:
. A settlement had been established by Jonathon Bird in the winter of 1840, three miles east of where Birdville is today. In 1843, Sam Houston came to what was then called Fort Bird or Bird's Fort and remained more than a month, awaiting chiefs from different tribes to discuss a peace parley. Houston departed, leaving Gen. Edward H. Tarrant and George W. Terrell to meet with the chiefs. When the tribes came to the negotiating table, a treaty was made under which the Native Americans were to remain to the west of a line traced passing through the future site of Fort Worth. The line marked “Where the West Begins” -- giving Fort Worth its famous slogan. from a website put out by Fort Worth government

Will Rogers expanded the quote to "Fort Worth is where the West Begins and Dallas is where the East peters out!  Even the tourist info center volunteers cheered when we told them we had chosen to visit Fort Worth over Dallas!  Funny.

 We then drove over to the museum district but just walked around. We arrived early in Arlington to Globe Life Stadium, home of the Texas Rangers. We walked all around the perimeter to make sure we didn't miss anything. This is one of those parks that is surrounded by parking lots, so had to bite the bullet and pay the $15.00 to park. There is a kid's park that can be rented out from the Rangers but it is locked up.

Everything is big in Texas!  Notice the Mariners fans

 Seeing as the there are no restaurants outside the ballpark, we shopped around for food inside. We were in luck as the food here appeared to be the best we have seen so far. We ended up with the “Sausage sundae” which looked like a banana split, with the sausage split like a banana, a mound of beef brisket, mashed potatoes and the best mac and cheese with a red pepper on top for the cherry. It was enough to feed us both. Too bad we dug in before we had a chance to photograph it. We initially sat up high behind home plate and eventually moved down above the Mariner's dugout as many fans left in the 7^th. We had a chance to photograph “Jerry's palace” near dusk, the new Cowboy Stadium.

Home of The Dallas Cowboys

 The Mariners defeated the Rangers with a sweep. Sweet. We met some Mariner's fans from Tennessee, a woman and her mom in a wheelchair. They try to visit about 3 stadiums a year, but only go to see the Mariners play. We told them about our trip. Back late to our hosts house and to bed.

More on the game and Globe Life Ball Park in the next blog.