If you told me Saturday morning that I would be on my way to Dallas, Texas in 24 hours I would’ve laughed in your face.
Most of the time I make very thought out decisions. I’m not a sporadic person. I don’t go on trips on a whim.
That changed Saturday night—at least for 48 hours.
Saturday morning
One of my best friends Lauren told me she wanted to go to Dallas. I really just brushed off her comment because we would have to fly there, get tickets, have a hotel, etc. It was too late to make it happen.
Saturday afternoon
She convinced me and we had a flight booked.
We were looking into flights, and some were over $1,000. That was not a price we wanted to pay, so we decided to look locally at flights in North Carolina. Lauren lives close to the Raleigh-Durham airport so we could drive up there.
So, I got packed.
Saturday night
We drove to Lauren’s house and arrived around 11:30 p.m. We had to be awake at 4:30 a.m. to make our 6:30 a.m. flight. Those five hours of sleep were not enough but the adrenaline kept us going!
Sunday morning
We were off to Dallas!
Our flight first was to the Washington airport and then we connected to Dallas. It’s amuses me how airplane connecting flights work.
We arrived to our hotel around 11:30 a.m., but it felt like it should be at least 4 p.m. since we’d been up so long. We were able to check in and unpack a little bit. Our hotel was in Grapevine, Texas and there was a mall right across the street. We decided to walk over because we needed a few things. The mall was huge! It wasn’t as big as the Mall of America but I think it was close 🙂
The mall even had a dollar store in it so we were able to make signs for the game. After we got everything we needed, we headed back to the hotel to get ready.
Saturday afternoon
Texas has In-N-Out burger! I’ve always wanted to go so I talked Lauren into it. It was pretty good! It wasn’t everything I had dreamed of but overall a good burger joint. After we fueled up for the game we headed to the city where the arena was. We went to claim our tickets and walked around a bit.
We held our signs and took some pictures. I’m just saying, we did draw a small crowd. Our signs were a hit!
When we entered the arena we walked around a bit and found our seats. We were up in the nosebleeds, but still excited. We then went down to lower court and stood around and held our signs. Once again we were a hit! We were happy they were getting a lot of attention. It really added to the experience.
Once the game was about to start we went back to our seats and got ready to watch the Gamecocks play. I put my phone down to watch the opening and when I had picked it back up I had SO MANY texts saying we got on TV! Lauren and I were so happy. That was a small goal we had in the back of our minds.
The rest of the game we just sat, watched the game, took some concession breaks, etc.
While the fourth quarter was going on, Lauren and I decided we wanted to try to get closer seats. (When I say Lauren and I what I really mean is Lauren because I was fine with our seats but she persuaded me otherwise… I’m glad she did).
The only problem with trying to get closer seats was they were now checking tickets in order to get in the lower sections. This was obviously a problem as we didn’t have those tickets. We stood outside the section we wanted to get to and people were starting to leave. We then took a chance and asked a couple if they would mind giving us their tickets. We said we were students and just trying to get closer to see them win. It worked! They gave us their tickets and off we were to the lower section!
The rest from here is a blur.
The clock ran down.
The Gamecocks were up.
The clocks hit 0 and the Jumbotron read “National Champions South Carolina”.
The alma mater played and we sang it with pride.
There were tears of joy.
It was amazing.
It’s truly an experience I will never forget.
Sunday night
We stayed in the arena for almost an hour after the game watching the ceremony. After we left we were so hungry but not much is left open close to 9 p.m. on a Sunday night. We decided to go back to our hotel and see what we could order. We ultimately bought our dinner from the hotel market so my Lean Cuisine meal wasn’t the best thing in the world but it did its job. Lauren had an assignment due that she had to work on that. I just ate dinner and got ready for bed. The exhaustion hit us both at 10 p.m. By that point we had been awake for almost 20 straight hours. We were ready for bed!
Monday morning
We both woke up relatively early and got the continental breakfast offered by the hotel. After breakfast we decided to go back to the mall since we didn’t have to check out until noon. We did some more light shopping and then headed back to the hotel and finished packing up. Then we were headed back to the airport!
Monday afternoon
We got a light lunch and then got on the plane. We landed back in Raleigh around 5:30 p.m. We grabbed dinner with Lauren’s family then got on the road back to Columbia. By 11:45 I was in bed and very thankful.
This trip was amazing. It was sporadic but I had one of the best times. I never make crazy decisions like this but I’m glad Lauren and I were able to see history made. It was crazy but I would certainly do it again.
A big thank you to Lauren’s parents who helped to make this trip possible. Couldn’t of done it without them taking us to the airport and helping us out. 