Undeterred by the pouring rain, Ms. Cinnamon and I headed out for the afternoon. I asked if she wanted to have lunch out and she suggested Vietnamese, which was exactly what I had in mind. So we headed over to the Bistro B.
The restaurant has a crazy huge and overwhelming menu. I decided that we didn’t have all day and that I wanted vermicelli, chicken, and lemongrass, which I found as a number 113. Ms. Cinnamon ordered the same thing.
The ginormous meal of fresh salad, noodles, meat, and a side of fish sauce looked lovely and tasted pretty good, but it was nowhere near lemongrassy enough for me. There was just a hint of it in some bites, but for a meal labeled lemongrass, it wasn’t enough. So I questioned the server and he offered to take back our food, but we refused since there was nothing wrong with it and we didn’t want to have to wait for them to make something new.
Well, he came back minutes later with a small plate heaped with more lemongrass and sautéd onions! And guess what he told us? That the chef purposely toned it down because the dish is too flavourful for most of the folks who come to the restaurant! Now, what we were served was not bland in the least, but the added lemongrass really made it shine. Yu-um!
Sated, Ms. Cinnamon and I headed out to tour the Perot Museum of Science and Nature, which is new in Dallas. I took a picture of the exterior when I was out the other day. It was almost 2:30 when we arrived and the museum closes at 5:00. Well, we had just enough time to see everything, but would have really needed another hour or two!
This is a very hands on museum with a lot of fun activities. From the lobby, you get a dizzying escalator ride straight up to the fourth floor dinosaurs and space exhibits, and then you work your way down.
The museum is great for kids and the kid at heart. My favourite exhibit was up in the fourth floor mezzanine birds exhibit where you put on 3D glasses and get to soar like a bird. The effect is remarkable as you get to swoop, dive, and fly by moving your body. This photo gallery gives a small sample of the exhibits. At $15, the museum isn’t cheap, but you get a lot of bang for your buck!
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- Bistro B has really good Vietnamese food.
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- Riding up the escalator to the fourth floor. This is the angled windowed piece of the building.
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- There are several very steep escalators to get to the top.
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- We started off with the dinosaurs.
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- This is an Edmontonsaurus!
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- See the fierce fellow in the back?
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- A mammoth.
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- A tortoise.
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- A ginomormous Alamosaurus.
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- Astronaut floating over the space exhibit.
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- This quote about birds could be about full-time RVers, or any nomads, really.
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- Looking down at the Alamosaurus.
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- Ms. Cinnamon pretends to be a bird.
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- The bathroom sinks are really odd.
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- I do like the colour of the stalls.
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- This is a giant REAL amethyst geode. There is a steering wheel thingy outside the display to open and close the rock.
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- There were lots of gemstones on display.
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- This exhibit let me crank out all of about a watt in a minute and a half.
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- A mining drill 10x the size of a real one.
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- In this ride, we are ‘shrunk down to the size of a golf ball’ and taken down into the bedrock to experience fracking.
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- Tornado simulator.
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- Living roof.
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- Another shot of the living roof.
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- I like how there is a hole in the roof for the tree.
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- Another mezzanine before the first floor gives us a good view of the big cats.
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- Sound travels much faster through steel than through air.
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- On the first floor, there are exhibits of the various Texan ecosystems.
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- This was a fun activity where you could create a climate and then you would see how the Furby-like create would evolve for that climate over several generations.
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- This is a real man who was preserved Ferengi-style by being frozen and then sliced into thin layers.
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- Same thing, but with a woman.
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- This is a really cool ‘wooden mirror.’ Each piece has a tiny motor. They shift as you move in front of it to show your reflection.
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- See how the man’s reflection is taking shape?
We stopped at the Central Market, a super fancy grocery store, on the way home to grab something quick and easy for dinner. I got a few groceries and then spent some time in the deli area trying to decide what I was in the mood for. The sushi very tempting, but I went with my first instinct, which was to have a mixed Mediterranean plate with hummus, falafel, tabbouleh, cucumber and tomato salad, and lots of other good stuff where you pay by the weight of your container. Yum!
It was really cold today (I doubt we hit 50F), but at least the sky has cleared.
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