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austin roadtrip notes
May. 18th, 2010 12:16 am- Beaumont, TX. Appears to be an empty shell of a town with vacant downtown and standard/obligatory contrived waterfront entertainment district. It is also a vortex of vague and contradictory directions. We tried to find the location of the Spindletop but gave up after driving in circles for 20 minutes.
- Bee Cave, TX. The green sign at the city limit says "Population 656," but the next sign says "Now open! Hill Country Galleria, 1.3 million square feet of retail!" Build, baby, build! The developments have names like "The Homestead" and "The Preserve". Like Orange County CA and the creep of Los Angeles into the mountains, I find the suburban/exurban onslaught here psychologically taxing.
But the hilly limestone terrain, covered in juniper and scrub oak: <3 <3 <3 <3
- UT Austin. Reminds me so much of Berkeley. The dog particularly enjoyed running around on the campus and chasing the local squirrels.
- Salt Lick BBQ. Most carnivorous wedding I've ever attended, was held at the wedding pavilion at ~. Nice spot for the ceremony, by a creek under oak trees.
- Spider House. I have a weakness for anything with christmas lights and Spider House sets the perfect trap.
- Swimming Lessons for Dogs. Austin has a beautiful waterway through the middle of town, idyllic with kayakers and swimming holes. The whole place seems to be set upon a porous foundation which provides for the fourth most volumous cold spring in the state of texas, which now wells up into a giant public swimming pool. The overflow is a free-for-all of splashing around in the cold current, very popular now in the hot springtime. Kids, adults, and dogs, all frolicking in the water. Adding "swimming holes" to interests. Also, karst hydrology. <3 <3 <3
- LBJ presidential library & museum. He was born in a city named for his family. I knew about the unpopular war, but not that he won a term on his own merits, or that he started Medicare and so many other things. I was not at the museum long enough to take in its entirely, but I felt it covered more the events leading up to his presidency than the presidency itself. The parting words of the museum are LBJ's parting words to congress, judgmentally ambiguous: "I hope it may be said, 100 years from now, that we helped to make this country more just. That's what I hope. But I believe that at least it will be said that we tried."
- Bee Cave, TX. The green sign at the city limit says "Population 656," but the next sign says "Now open! Hill Country Galleria, 1.3 million square feet of retail!" Build, baby, build! The developments have names like "The Homestead" and "The Preserve". Like Orange County CA and the creep of Los Angeles into the mountains, I find the suburban/exurban onslaught here psychologically taxing.
But the hilly limestone terrain, covered in juniper and scrub oak: <3 <3 <3 <3
- UT Austin. Reminds me so much of Berkeley. The dog particularly enjoyed running around on the campus and chasing the local squirrels.
- Salt Lick BBQ. Most carnivorous wedding I've ever attended, was held at the wedding pavilion at ~. Nice spot for the ceremony, by a creek under oak trees.
- Spider House. I have a weakness for anything with christmas lights and Spider House sets the perfect trap.
- Swimming Lessons for Dogs. Austin has a beautiful waterway through the middle of town, idyllic with kayakers and swimming holes. The whole place seems to be set upon a porous foundation which provides for the fourth most volumous cold spring in the state of texas, which now wells up into a giant public swimming pool. The overflow is a free-for-all of splashing around in the cold current, very popular now in the hot springtime. Kids, adults, and dogs, all frolicking in the water. Adding "swimming holes" to interests. Also, karst hydrology. <3 <3 <3
- LBJ presidential library & museum. He was born in a city named for his family. I knew about the unpopular war, but not that he won a term on his own merits, or that he started Medicare and so many other things. I was not at the museum long enough to take in its entirely, but I felt it covered more the events leading up to his presidency than the presidency itself. The parting words of the museum are LBJ's parting words to congress, judgmentally ambiguous: "I hope it may be said, 100 years from now, that we helped to make this country more just. That's what I hope. But I believe that at least it will be said that we tried."
