Can I add another week of vacation?

Seriously folks, I could use a whole extra week of spring break. Not to be all cliché and use tired old phrases, but I could use a vacation to rest from my vacation. Spring Break 2009 ended up being quite the whirlwind tour of the southeastern US. All in all it was an AMAZING time, but man it's hard on your body to go, go, go 24/7 for a week and a half.

Anyway, I can't really do this trip justice just by blabbing on and on with the risk of getting slightly boring. It was way too awesome and I want to toss a few pictures up here to show it rather than just talk about it.

For the first leg of the trip, we had planned on leaving OKC by 2 so that we would get into Memphis, TN by around midnight. However, the best laid plans often fail, especially when it comes to gathering 15 foreigners at a specific time (just as a side note, we started calling ourselves the "United Nations". In addition to having a few Americans, we had people from Spain, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Venezuela, Germany, and Peru. Let's just say I got lots of spanish practice.) So we ended up finally packing up our 4 rental cars and leaving at 7:30. Which meant we got to Memphis at around 4:30 in the morning.

After getting an all-too-short night's sleep, we got up the next day and headed to see the sights of Memphis. 

First item on the agenda was to hit up Beall Street, which is Memphis' big street of music clubs, restaurants, and bars. So here is a group shot of all of us right after having a HUGE meal of delicious bbq. We also were lucky enough to finish dinner right around the time a big St. Patrick's Day parade took place.

And of course, you can't take a trip to Memphis without checking out the home of the King of Rock and Roll. Here Kayla and I are posing in front of the Graceland sign. I can't lie, I've never been a huge Elvis fan, so it wasn't the most exciting part of the trip for me. But it was still cool to see.

The next leg of our trip was a stop in Montgomery, AL. Once again, we pulled into town nice and late, and after driving through non-stop rain, we were ready to hit the sack. But the next day we checked out the very few sights of Montgomery, most of which revolved around Martin Luther King, Jr. and Civil Rights history. Here is the group posed in front of something to do with the capital. It was right across the street from Martin Luther King's church.

And of course, the next stop was the main part of the trip, Panama City Beach, FL. AKA the sight of MTV's Spring Break Beach. So not only was it an amazing beach, but we also were lucky enough to get to see the All American Rejects and Flo Rida in concert completely for free. You can see the big concert stage behind us in this one.

One sad part of this amazing beach is that there were drunk people EVERYWHERE. Which means there were discarded beer cans and bottles all over the beach (which I found out later would be very painful if stepped on). Here is our group on the beach and you can kind of see the litter all over the place.

And then here is a picture just of the guys. Most of the guys I knew really well before the trip, but there were a few that were just acquaintances beforehand. I honestly can't imagine a cooler group of guys to hang out with for 9 days.

The last day was the best day of all with a completely cloudless sky, which made for amazingly blue water and perfect white, sandy beaches. In this picture is Jorge and Gloria from Spain, Kayla who is applying to the same Spain grad program I am, Fiorella from Peru, and me. The five of us spent a ton of quality time together over this trip because we all shared one of the rental cars. What a fun group of people.

The next stop of the trip was New Orleans, which we didn't arrive in until around 1:30 am, in true group fashion. I can't lie, it was kind of a scary city in the early morning hours. But as soon as the sun came up, the city was just as great as all the others we had seen. Here we are early the next morning eating beignets, which are pretty typical NOLA food. They're a french fried doughnut kind of thing and they're pretty similar to funnel cakes.

Of course, New Orleans wasn't without it quirks, as expected. These little painted signs were all over the city, among several other odd things. We never did find the "real" blood.

And then we stumbled upon this big free meal that a church was putting on in honor of St. Joseph's Day. It was cool because we got to try a few other New Orleans' dishes, completely for free this time. And free is always nice, especially when you've been paying for meals for 8 days. This is the group of us sitting on the church lawn enjoying the food.

Next stop: San Antonio, TX. The original plan had included a stop over night in Houston as we wouldn't get there until around 1 or 2 in the morning. But we decided last minute to continue on to San Antonio and didn't get there until 4:30. So typical of us.

But San Antonio is always good for a nice, calm time and we enjoyed ourselves on the Riverwalk and the Alamo. Here we are on the Riverwalk about to take in some fantastic Mexican food.

Last stop: Austin, TX. The original plan was to spend one last night in the Texas state capital, but we were all tired and couldn't imagine spending another night out, so we just made a quick jaunt through. Here we are in one of the University of Texas' bookstores showing our true Sooner spirit.

Of course, Kayla and I weren't satisfied with just holding a few shirts upside down and throwing the Un-Hookem' Horns sign. So we proceeded to walk around the entire store and turn every single removable sign upside-down. And here we are in the aftermath.

Sure, I'll be the first to admit that it sucked for the guy who was working that day. But no one could possibly expect us to sit idly by and do nothing to our arch-enemies. Right?

We were lucky again as we got into Austin just in time to experience South By Southwest, a giant music festival held every year in town at this time. It was really cool to see the crowds that came into town for it, as it fit right in with everyone's mental image of weird Austin. 

So anyway, just like always, we didn't end up leaving Austin until around 11:30 at night, which made for a LONG drive home ending with us pulling into Norman at around 5:30 in the morning. And Jordan was a sleepy boy. And Jordan still hasn't fully recovered.

Anyway, I know this post is getting ridiculously long and I've probably lost you by this point. But all in all it was an amazing trip with an amazing group of people and I can't possibly think of any better way to spend my last spring break.