Well, we thought Saturday was going to be a bust, but it worked out OK in the end.
Lessons learned yesterday. It is faster to do a take out order at a very crowded Denny's and then go join everyone else to eat it. Scott was volunteered to drive some of us to Starbucks and then come back and meet everyone at Denny's. When we got back, they had ordered, but the place was packed and the service was slow. So, Scott ordered his Egg's over MyHammy, got it in about 4 minutes and then sat down with everyone else to eat it. Now, I might question eating at Denny's in the first place, but this is the US of A.
Next, you can find wireless Internet at McDonald's (yet another fine eating establishment----not). However, if you go ask for the coupon, you can get an hour of free Internet. The trick is finding someone at the counter that knows what the Internet or WiFi actually is and then finding a manager who actually can find the free coupons. We are 1 for 3 in actually getting online at McDonald's. So, we continue to go to our backup plan. Just about any hotel now has free WiFi.
The drive from Wichita Falls to Lubbock is one of the most boring drives I've been on. Not only that, there is hundreds of miles of 4 lane highway for almost no cars. Just amazing. Must be the home of the President.
Ron got to the camera store he wanted to visit (thanks Stuart and Michele--you both gave us the same information, however Ritz camera is no longer in business). Not that it was a competition, but Michele came through first. He is now the proud owner of a new 10-22mm lens for his Canon Camera, not without an argument with Scotia Visa who decided that it really wasn't him at the end of the card.
Now, to the chase (no pun intended). We had thought that today was a bust, but at about 7pm (with Dave and I looking to find a hockey game to watch), Ron came by and said there was a supercell north of the city (about an hour away). We tore out of town to the north and just barely crossed in front of it as the sun was setting. That included running down some very narrow dry dirt roads (you don't want to be on them when it rains as you will get stuck).
We kept in front of it trying to get some good pictures. At one point we could hear the 1" hail pinging the ground all around us and off the cars. Dave took a direct hit on the lip as well. Then, there was this noise...and we could hear this wall of hail headed towards us. We all scattered into the cars just as it hit. Wow, now that was impressive.
We tracked this storm as it merged with 3 others for about 4 hours. Apparently once it got into Lubbock, it produced a Tornado (yet to be confirmed) to the west of us. We also heard that there was 3" hail in it at places.
Pictures are at http://portcredit.net/gallery/thumbnails.php?album=14&page=6.
We are headed to the west of Lubbock today.
Lessons learned yesterday. It is faster to do a take out order at a very crowded Denny's and then go join everyone else to eat it. Scott was volunteered to drive some of us to Starbucks and then come back and meet everyone at Denny's. When we got back, they had ordered, but the place was packed and the service was slow. So, Scott ordered his Egg's over MyHammy, got it in about 4 minutes and then sat down with everyone else to eat it. Now, I might question eating at Denny's in the first place, but this is the US of A.
Next, you can find wireless Internet at McDonald's (yet another fine eating establishment----not). However, if you go ask for the coupon, you can get an hour of free Internet. The trick is finding someone at the counter that knows what the Internet or WiFi actually is and then finding a manager who actually can find the free coupons. We are 1 for 3 in actually getting online at McDonald's. So, we continue to go to our backup plan. Just about any hotel now has free WiFi.
The drive from Wichita Falls to Lubbock is one of the most boring drives I've been on. Not only that, there is hundreds of miles of 4 lane highway for almost no cars. Just amazing. Must be the home of the President.
Ron got to the camera store he wanted to visit (thanks Stuart and Michele--you both gave us the same information, however Ritz camera is no longer in business). Not that it was a competition, but Michele came through first. He is now the proud owner of a new 10-22mm lens for his Canon Camera, not without an argument with Scotia Visa who decided that it really wasn't him at the end of the card.
Now, to the chase (no pun intended). We had thought that today was a bust, but at about 7pm (with Dave and I looking to find a hockey game to watch), Ron came by and said there was a supercell north of the city (about an hour away). We tore out of town to the north and just barely crossed in front of it as the sun was setting. That included running down some very narrow dry dirt roads (you don't want to be on them when it rains as you will get stuck).
We kept in front of it trying to get some good pictures. At one point we could hear the 1" hail pinging the ground all around us and off the cars. Dave took a direct hit on the lip as well. Then, there was this noise...and we could hear this wall of hail headed towards us. We all scattered into the cars just as it hit. Wow, now that was impressive.
We tracked this storm as it merged with 3 others for about 4 hours. Apparently once it got into Lubbock, it produced a Tornado (yet to be confirmed) to the west of us. We also heard that there was 3" hail in it at places.
Pictures are at http://portcredit.net/gallery/thumbnails.php?album=14&page=6.
We are headed to the west of Lubbock today.
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