Turtles in a Tree -- Sun., Apr. 7

Today is a free day from the A-to-Z Challenge, so tomorrow's letter will be "G."

Austin, Texas was our destination to see our son Randall who is now living there. We picked him up at the place he's staying and headed to lunch at Luke's. Marissa, his girlfriend in Portland, Oregon, saw a show on TV about this place. When we got there, they were not serving lunch; instead they were serving brunch in Gibson's next door for $19.00 a plate. That was a little steep for our budget, so we took him to Chuy's instead. We will go back to Luke's on a day we can have their normal lunch. (Marissa I took these photos for you.)

Bob and Randall outside Luke's food trailer.

Randall the chameleon blending in with Luke's trailer.

The menu.

Gibson's Restaurant which served the brunch we didn't eat.

Chuy's--where we ate.

Chuy's loves all things Elvis!

Then, because Randall's new to Texas, we hauled him over to Barton Springs at Zilker Park so he could see the swimming hole all his friends told him about. We walked from Barton Springs to Lady Bird Lake for a view of downtown Austin.

Barton Springs swimming area.

Barton Springs--83 degrees outside today.

"Get away from me or I'll kick your face!"

Six turtles sunning in a tree.

Austin, Texas with Lady Bird Lake in the foreground.

Our after-lunch walk was enjoyable. We had a chance to catch up with Randall's life. He had quite an adventure getting from Nebraska's freezing cold to Austin by bus a few weeks ago. He was moving three heavy boxes of tools and had to change buses three or four times. But he made it safe and sound.

We did a "let's get lost" driving tour to look for wildflowers east of Austin. We went through Elgin, headed north, saw a good roadside display of bluebonnets. We turned off the road we were on and meandered through beautiful green farmland. Randall got to see his first longhorn cattle.

The road we were on lead us directly to Luminant's Three Oaks Mine. From what we could see it looked like a huge strip mining operation with coal-scooping machines known as "draglines" sprinkled across the landscape. We also saw coal. Coal? In Texas? We learning something new today.

In my Google search, I found an Austin Chronicle article from 2008 regarding strip mining in Elgin, Texas, 25 miles east of Austin. According to the article, "...there are 14 active strip mines in Texas, all producing lignite, a low-grade coal that emits nearly twice the greenhouse gases, smog, and mercury pollution of higher density coals."

A few wildflowers graced the countryside, but nowhere near what we expected to see. I took a couple of photos.

The landscape as we whizzed by at 70 mph.

Indian paintbrush.

Drummond's phlox

With that we ended our serene, green drive, dropped Randall off at his place, and headed to San Antonio. We enjoyed re-connecting with him as we hadn't seen him for 1-1/2 years. We plan to get together more frequently. And we'll make it to Barton Springs for swimming, and Luke's for lunch yet!

Travel Bug out.

Go Fly a Kite! -- Sun., Mar. 3

Color My World (Lyrics by Chicago) or maybe I should say, "Will it fly high like a bird up in the sky?" (Lyrics by Billy Preston). I'm referring to the 85th Annual Kite Festival in Austin, Texas.

Jim and Peri invited us to go with them. The conditions were perfect. The skies were a light sapphire blue and a nice breeze was blowing to make the kites soar.

The Kite Festival is very popular in Austin as you will see in the following photos. We parked about a mile away from Zilker Park and walked over. The nearer we got, the more kites we could see. We entered a world of color, crowds and commotion.

Dragon kite.

Kites and people were everywhere. We were constantly scanning the ground for kite lines, watching our heads to make sure a kite wasn't coming down on top of us, keeping a watch on lines at neck level as people tried to start the kite flight. I would guess thousands of people were there today.

All the little dots in the sky are kites.

Butterfly and panda kites.

Pirate ship kite.

Father of the little boy.

Son learning how to fly a kite with the help of his father.

 

Another pirate kite.

If you're not into kites, then maybe hula hoops?

Wow! Four hula hoops at once.

People watching is always interesting. What are the young folks wearing now? LOL.

Then back to kite watching.

Jim, Bob, Peri

These are the big kites!

Bob's like, "Oh, c'mon, really?"

Watch out for the Red Baron!

Austin skyline from Zilker Park. Crowds and...

More crowds.

Flying fire truck.

Lots and lots of people!

Jim capturing the festival.

The following photo is deceptive. I took it because the guy is flying a little tiny kite (about the size of your hand) with a fishing pole. The kite looks like it's very high in the sky when, in reality, it's about ten feet from the end of his fishing pole. His kite is the red and black one at the top of the photo.

After spending an hour in the park, we headed to lunch at Chuy's Fine Tex-Mex. Bob had been to Chuy's in San Antonio, but I hadn't eaten at one until today. It was very good. The decor was fun with some Elvis posters and rock 'n' roll memorabilia.

One mean-looking parrot.

I tried a Southwestern Enchilada that was made with blue corn tortillas, hand-pulled chicken, cheese, green chile sauce (spicy!) and a fried egg. The dish came with rice, a salad and refried beans.

Southwestern Enchilada.

Bob's lunch--I think it's the Deluxe Chicken Enchilada.

All of us enjoyed our food and cleaned our plates. Well, I had a little help with mine because it was a lot.

We walked the mile and a half back to where the car was parked. As you can see people are still pouring into and out of the park.

We had planned on a 10K Volksmarch, but since we had already done 5K just walking on our own, we did a 5K Volksmarch instead. It seemed like a very short walk after all the 10K walks we've been doing. We chose the Lady Bird Lake walk because it had a 5K option. Bob and I had done the 10K walk two weeks ago, but we like the walk so we did the short version of it.

Bob and Susan with Austin skyline. (Photo by Jim D.)

Red bud tree.

Kite flying crashing in a less-crowded park.

These purple flowers feel just like velvet.

Salvia leucantha

Stevie Ray Vaughan statue by Lady Bird Lake.

Greater scaups.

The ghost bike has been decorated!

Austin, Texas -- state capitol dome.

State Capitol in Austin, Texas.

We drove by this sculpture.

After our Volksmarch, Jim drove us around downtown Austin. Bob and I were able to take the three photos above from the car window. We had fun exploring Austin and spending time with Peri and Jim. On the way back to Peri and Jim's 5er, a Dairy Queen jumped in our path and we had to stop for Blizzards. Just couldn't get around it.

When we made it back to the 5er, we played a number of games of Sequence. Peri and Susan had quite the winning streak. Toward the end of the evening, Bob and Jim won three games in a row so they didn't get skunked.

Sometime during the week Peri and I plan to do the New Braunfels Volksmarch. That's it. Enjoy your Monday wherever you may be.

Susan & Bob