Austin Outdoor Fun

We woke up rather late and nearly missed the free breakfast at our HAMPTON Inn. Have you stayed at one before? We love them. Consistently clean and a wonderful free breakfast. We headed south and stopped at our Hampton Inn in Waco - why? For a jacket that was left behind. Would have been handy to have in Dallas with all that rain yesterday - but at least we retrieved it and don’t have to buy a new one.

And can you believe that we stopped in Italy today? Yup, there’s an Italy, Texas and we needed gas so it seemed like an appropriate place to stop. We’ve had a few connections to Italy on this trip that seem to be sending me messages -perhaps our next adventure will be in the boot country. Wait, we’re already there. Hm....

We rolled into Austin around 2pm and since tummies were growling, Todd searched through Yelp for something we haven’t had on this trip - TexMex! We’ve had sushi, BBQ, pizza, Chinese (Thanks PandaExpress for being open on Christmas Day!), and now we’ve had some Mexican. And it was good!

This place sold some cute shirts too, but we didn’t grab any. Chuy’s was a great stop since the portions were huge and we now have dinner (since we will be glued to the TV watching the Niners win their last regular season game!). Obligatory food pics...

Yes, the blackberry margarita was amazing. Tart and tasty. Just a quarter mile away from the joint was the Umlauf Sculpture Gardens. It’s a beautiful day here in Austin and the sun is shining so this walk was indeed enjoyed.

They are a hoot!

There was an indoor art exhibit as well and it was incredibly thought provoking. Lots of images that referenced slavery and the Nazis. Deep stuff. What’s your interpretation of that Snow White piece?

This next place would be a must do stop if it were summer time. We were shocked to find as many people swimming as we did. This is a community pool, but the surface is natural river so while it is dammed up, there are salamanders in there! Yes, there’s a whole habitat for them because apparently they are endangered. We didn’t test out our swimsuits but the walk was just as lovely.

It’s rather huge, and do you see the diving board? There were even life guards. The pictures I’ve found online look like this place is crowded on a hot day. We enjoyed the sunshine and the views. This is a beautiful park. Very similar to SF’s Golden Gate, this place seems to be hopping on a Sunday. And the views of downtown Austin were a nice bonus.

And off we went to another outdoor adventure. The FREE Austin Nature and Science Center. This place would be great for little kids since there’s a dinosaur excavation site - so cool! It also had birds being rehabilitated and an indoor animal sanctuary as well. This was a nice hour to stroll and enjoy the sun.

We have more planned for Austin, but football calls and we are relaxing on the deserted 18th floor restaurant of our downtown hotel. The sunset views were amazing.

And the card game with these lovies was even better ❤️