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Published: November 9th 2011
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So we picked up our rental car at New Orleans airport and began the long drive to Austin. It was actually cheaper than the three of us getting a bus which was great as it's much nicer to have a car. The drive was only 8 hours (I can't believe we now think 8 hours is a relatively short drive) so we were doing it in one day. The drive went fine, we stopped for lunch and was pretty uneventful, until we got pulled over for speeding. Bit of a fail - was just after the speed limit had changed - the interstate swaps and changes the speed limits all the time. Nevertheless, it was pretty nerve racking but luckily the US cop was pretty nice about it. Still a bit of a dent into James' saved money. We now can laugh about it!
The one hostel in Austin was fully booked and we managed to find a really cheap deal on Expedia for the Holiday Inn for about the same price as a hostel. A nice hotel was very welcome! It also included a free shuttle from the airport and so we arrived at Austin around 6pm, dropped the
car off and hopped on the Holiday Inn shuttle. We checked in, and ordered some food and watched TV, a bit too exhausted from our 8 hour car journey to be bothered to do anything.
James practices Aikido and had been thinking of contacting a local group whilst we were travelling, so the week before he had emailed a group in Austin and had been invited to spend the next morning with them. So on Saturday morning James went off to meet them whilst Aled and I set out to explore Austin. The hotel was only a 15 - 20 minute walk to downtown which was very handy too (the hostel was much further out). We walked to 6th Street (main entertainment district) and up to the State Capitol and generally wandered around before meeting James for lunch at 1pm. We immediately liked Austin. It was one of the places I really wanted to visit whilst travelling and we'd had many recommendations and you could see why. It was fun, cool, and liberal city which really suited us - rather different to the rest of Texas.
After lunch we went into the Capitol building and went on a
free tour. The building is massive and very impressive - it is even bigger that the country's Capitol building in DC - pure Texan. Everything about the elegant decor inside, down to the (rather tacky) chandelier lights in the house of representatives spelling out T-E-X-A-S, shows off their "bigger is better" attitude in Texas. The tour was very interesting and informative, and even left you loving Texas a little bit. Austin has the flagship Whole Foods store (which we love), so we visited that and bought some delicious dinner to have back at the hotel.
That evening we headed out to 6th Street for a few drinks, and found a good little bar with some live music. Trying to stick to budget, we only had two drinks and then headed back to the hotel for some sleep.
The next day we had a much needed long lie in, which was very easy to do in comfy hotel beds without the noise of other travellers in their dorm beds! We set out again to explore Austin and ended up just walking for ages before finding lunch in a cheap chain pita joint and then visiting the Texas State Museum.
This again represented all things Texas, with interesting exhibits about how awesome Texas is. It also hosted an exhibit on high school american football, "More Than Just a Game" which demonstrated an all-american look at how important high school football really is. It was fascinating to us, as the world of homecomings, pep rallies and over the top sports games are alien to our secondary schools.
We then headed back to the hotel and spent the evening successfully planning for Vegas, including booking hotels and flights before ordering some food in.
The next day was our last day in Austin (we would have spent maybe 1 or 2 days longer but the cheaper flights to Vegas were on a Tuesday). We went for breakfast at an IHOP (International House of Pancakes, for those not in the know!) which was absolutely delicious but made you feel like you would surely have a heart attack if you ate here more than once. We then headed in the direction of Whole Foods again as there was an awesome book store and record store right next store (heaven for all of us). We spent a few hours wandering around the book store,
then record store and then Whole Foods again before heading back to the hotel for a swim and down time before our Bat Cruise that evening.
"What is a Bat Cruise??" I hear you cry. Well, unbeknownst to us before we arrived here, Austin has the largest urban population of bats in the world. They all live under the Congress Bridge just south of downtown from before migrating to Mexico each Winter. Every day at sunset when the bats reside in Austin, they emerge from under the bridge in a massive swarm to feed. It is a huge tourist attraction in Austin and there are many companies that offer bat cruises as well as large groups of tourists that gather on the bridge to watch every evening. It was truly an amazing spectacle. We had never seen anything like it, and of course the pictures don't do it justice. The cruise itself it a small boat with commentary from a tour guide pointing out the sights of the Austin skyline and history of the bats, before placing itself right under the bridge at sunset for the best view. A bit about it here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexican_Free-tailed_Bat#Migration). It was a great ending
to our stay in Austin.
The next morning we took the free airport shuttle to board the first out of our two flights to Vegas!
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