Don't Mess With Texas

We spent almost a whole week in Texas split between Austin and San Antonio. We were really excited to visit Austin, so we stayed for 4 nights before staying in San Antonio for 2 nights.

Austin

We arrived in Austin on our second long day of driving, Albuquerque to Oklahoma City in about 8 hours and Oklahoma City to Austin in about 6 hours. Our first night, we had enough time and energy to get some dinner at a nearby Indian restaurant before calling it a night. We didn't have the best weather when we were in town since it was gray, cool, and sometimes rainy most of the time we were there, which was kind of a bummer, but we still managed to enjoy ourselves.

Day 1

Since the weather was worst on our first day, we tried to plan indoor activities. We dropped by a unique antique store called Uncommon Objects and browsed the color coordinated displays of ancient trinkets collected on the walls, shelves, in corners of the shop. Once we worked up an appetite, we headed out to find Will some good barbecue at Micklethwait. We stopped and ordered me a pizza at East Side Pies and walked a half block down the road. The man taking Will's order at the BBQ place noticed my pizza and we started talking and learned that his wife was vegan as well which made me feel a little more welcome at the BBQ place with my vegan pizza.

After finishing up lunch, we hit up Lazarus Brewing to sample some beers. We had a goal to match Portland with breweries visited, so be prepared for more of that ;). We managed to visit two more, Friends and Allies Brewing and Hops and Grain Brewing before grabbing dinner at Bangers Sausage House and Beer Garden. My brother recommended we visit his friends who started Friends and Allies and we were able to meet both Devon and Nathan and get a little private tour and talk a little about the business which was great! They had some great beer too, so check them out if you're in the area!

Mural outside Hops and Grain

Day 2

On our second day, the rain cleared up for the most part even if the gray didn't, so we started our day at the Capitol building. We needed to get a photo for our map and preferred one out of the rain, but were interested in exploring a bit too. They provide free general tours at least every half hour with some special themed tours kicking off at different times during the day. We arrived in time for the tour at noon and learned about Texas history, government, and the building. The Texas state capitol building is taller than the US capitol building, but is only the 5th tallest capitol building in the country. The winner is Louisiana (which will come up later ;) ).

From the capitol, we walked a few blocks to a food truck called Arlo's which served all plant-based foods. We got a couple of the tastiest veggie burgers we've ever had. It was definitely junky, fast food, but it was delicious either way. Next, we started some mural hunting. We drove around a bit and snapped some photos and walked around South Congress Avenue looking for murals, browsing Allens Boots, and getting Will some pizza from Home Slice. Then we started our brewery visits for the day. We headed to Austin Beer Garden Brewing then Zilker Brewing Company before doing some more mural hunting in the 6th Street area. We got some delicious vegan tacos from The Vegan Nom and a vegan s'more brownie from Capital City Bakery, then we ended the day at St. Elmo Brewing.

Allens Boots

Day 3

On our third day, we started with breakfast tacos from Paco's Tacos. It was a bit of a drive north, so we took the opportunity to drive to Pennybacker Bridge. The bridge is a pretty major highway, and we weren't clear on the parking rules around, so we didn't end up getting out to explore or get photos, but we got to drive over it about 3 times with all of our turning around. Next we grabbed some late morning coffee at a Stonehouse Coffee before getting our breakfast dessert at VooDoo Doughnut. We were debating visiting in Austin since we had already gone to the original location in Portland, but donuts are always good and it's hard to pass up a place that has vegan options at the ready.

To walk off our donuts, we headed to Zilker Park. We found a big, open space with a bunch of dogs running around, so we headed that way. Another one of our favorite pastimes is dog-watching (like people-watching), so we took the opportunity to immerse ourselves in the dog space for a little before finding our way to a path along the river back to our car. We finished the day off by visiting Pinthouse Pizza for beers, Frank for hot dogs, Live Oak Brewing Company, and Independence Brewing Co. where we played Sequence Cats and Zombie Dice.

Dogs going crazy at the park

Game Day

The last morning we had in Austin was Saturday and the big game. We packed up, got some coffee at Radio Coffee & Beer and breakfast tacos from a truck outside the coffee shop and went down the road to Black Sheep Lodge to watch the MSU vs. OSU football game. We don't need to talk much more about it other than the fact that we went out of our way on our way out of town to get me a cupcake to drown my sorrows in from the delicious vegan bakery we discovered a couple days prior. Once we arrived in San Antonio, we were feeling lazy, so we grabbed some quick dinners at a local grocery store to heat up so we could relax for the evening.

Game Day!

Some of the murals we saw in Austin

Delicious vegan food in Austin

San Antonio

We only had one full day in San Antonio, so we made sure to hit up the Alamo and the Riverwalk. Will wasn't feeling 100% and it was raining off and on (but mostly on), so we didn't hang out for too long. It was unfortunate that we had bad luck that day because it looked like a cool place to hang out, so maybe we'll have to come back some day. We spent much of the evening relaxing at the Airbnb before preparing for our long drive to New Orleans the following morning. The drive was about 8 hours and we were able to make a quick stop in Baton Rouge to check out the Louisiana state capitol building. We arrived and got some pasta for dinner at a restaurant down the street and settled in for some New Orleans adventures to come.

The Alamo

Louisiana state capitol building