Hey guys and gals!
Today were doing a little recap of our time in Austin and San Antonio! Once we left Waco we headed towards Austin without having a clue what we were going to be doing there. Neither of us did too much research on that particular stop - I think because it was Christmas we were feeling a little lazy and just wanted to let things play out the way they would. There isn't much space for camping inside of Austin so we went the completely obvious sneaky route and just parked on the street in a nice neighborhood and hoped people would think we were in town visiting family... don't worry we didn't take anyone's parking spot. But! The neighborhood we chose ended up being right across the street from a big nice shopping center with Christmas activities galore, a gym, and a big park! So we really lucked out.
We were wandering around the first night and walked into the biggest whole foods store I have ever seen. I know this doesn't sound exciting but they had live music, a bar and an ice skating rink on the roof... whhaaattt? We were a little weary of spending too much time in the van because of where we were parked so we sat for a while and people watched while Blake ate his weight in cheese samples.
It was a really fun little area of town and we ended up loving it so much we barely left. Every morning we got up and went to Zilker Park which is essentially a huge river walk. It was the most populated trail I have ever seen and apparently it's always like that! We loved it because we could walk almost 10 miles on the trail with the dogs and the view was amazing - but I could not believe how many people were out. Austin - you are one active city!
Christmas Eve we did a little window shopping and toured around town just checking out the sites. We figured we would go out for a fancy dinner the following evening so we ended up at the bar at Whole Foods with a 12 pack and then eating 30 potstickers and spinach artichoke dip in the van.. it's a weird day, I know, but we had so much fun!
We started Christmas Day off with a 10 mile walk in the park - along with everyone else - and then went for a swim at Barton Springs. Barton Springs is this really cool little natural pool that is dammed off from the river that runs through the city. It's huge and its free all winter. It was so much fun and even though I was freezing in the water it was a welcome break from the insane humidity.
Once we were done swimming we headed back to our "campsite" and started trying to figure out where we were going to eat. It turns out... nothing is open on Christmas - and it shouldn't be! But we should have tried to figure that out sooner. We ended up at a 24 hour diner and it turned out to be totally delicious!
We were both a little sad to be missing the holiday with our family's - especially after seeing some pictures of our nephew opening his presents - but it was nice to do our own thing this year. Sometimes you have to make your own fun.
From Austin we made the 2 hour trip to San Antonio where we met up with my parents again! They have made such an effort to come explore with us and I really like spending time with them. They're really fun to vacation with. Another perk was that were in a hotel that week! So real beds, laundry, and more than a 100 sq. feet felt amazing!
The first day we went down to The Alamo. It's so touristy but fun to see and the legend is that if you touch the wall inside the Alamo that you are officially a Texan! I stayed away from it but Blake is wearing cowboy boots full time now ;) We also did the Riverwalk that day - which was a mad house! We ended up being there at the same time as the OSU vs CU bowl game and everyone and their mother was there for the game. It was nice to see so much Colorado spirit in Texas though.
The next day we planned to go for a walk in a park we had found online but got a little lost and ended up just parking and wandering around. We stumbled on a Japanese Zen Garden that was beautiful! It was such a neat and unexpected gem. Blake wandered around taking pictures for about 40 minutes by himself... because any place that looks like it would be a cool place to do yoga gets his mind running. When we left he told me that he was definitely building a dojo in our future backyard.
We met up with a family friend who lives there and they told us about a fun town outside of San Antonio called Fredricksburg. It's the cutest little German town and the wine capital of Texas! That part is funny because they can't grow their own grapes though so all of the wine is imported but they don't focus on that. We wandered around for most of the day just peeking into fun stores, eating sweets and a yummy german lunch. One of things that is really impressive in Fredericksburg is their huge <Pacific War museum>.We thought it was a strange place for a WWII museum but it turns out that Fredricksburg was the birthplace of the Commander in Chief of the United States Pacific Fleet during the war. The museum was so well done and they should be really proud of it. You could have spent a whole day in there, it was huge. My mom and I love museums and my dad is a WWII buff so it was really fun to see.
The rest of our time in San Antonio was really just spent eating, drinking, and enjoying our time together. It was a fun way to end the holiday season and we can't wait to meet up with them again soon. Even though we had so much fun there, it was good to get out of San Antonio. It was the last of a 3 week stretch of city camping and we both needed some fresh air and space - so we headed down to Corpus Christi! Catch our next post for deets on our mini beach vacay!
Happy Thursday Everyone!
- Brit
The next day we planned to go for a walk in a park we had found online but got a little lost and ended up just parking and wandering around. We stumbled on a Japanese Zen Garden that was beautiful! It was such a neat and unexpected gem. Blake wandered around taking pictures for about 40 minutes by himself... because any place that looks like it would be a cool place to do yoga gets his mind running. When we left he told me that he was definitely building a dojo in our future backyard.
We met up with a family friend who lives there and they told us about a fun town outside of San Antonio called Fredricksburg. It's the cutest little German town and the wine capital of Texas! That part is funny because they can't grow their own grapes though so all of the wine is imported but they don't focus on that. We wandered around for most of the day just peeking into fun stores, eating sweets and a yummy german lunch. One of things that is really impressive in Fredericksburg is their huge <Pacific War museum>.We thought it was a strange place for a WWII museum but it turns out that Fredricksburg was the birthplace of the Commander in Chief of the United States Pacific Fleet during the war. The museum was so well done and they should be really proud of it. You could have spent a whole day in there, it was huge. My mom and I love museums and my dad is a WWII buff so it was really fun to see.
The rest of our time in San Antonio was really just spent eating, drinking, and enjoying our time together. It was a fun way to end the holiday season and we can't wait to meet up with them again soon. Even though we had so much fun there, it was good to get out of San Antonio. It was the last of a 3 week stretch of city camping and we both needed some fresh air and space - so we headed down to Corpus Christi! Catch our next post for deets on our mini beach vacay!
Happy Thursday Everyone!
- Brit
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