Austin

February 15
More hanging out with the family (when they weren't out doing life stuff) before heading to Austin. The terrain between Houston and Austin was actually pretty interesting - a little hilly, more trees. We had one stop a little over halfway at Weikel's in LaGrange for kolaches. We acquired poppy seed, cherry, and prune filled varieties, and also a lemon bar. They were good so far as pastries go, though not my favorite by far. We arrived at a friend's from Minnesota (in Austin 5+ years),  Joe's, early evening, had lots of visiting, of course, and got in a relatively light, late dinner at Torchy's Tacos - no photos, but pretty awesome - you order per taco with fun ingredients and assemblies - I got Mr. Pink with Ahi Tuna, and The Independent with a bunch of veggies. After that, just hung out, being entertained by some late night talk shows.

February 16
Joe took a couple days off work to hang out with us - yay! It was a relatively cool morning, so we just hung out a bit before heading to the Greenbelt, right in Austin. Even on a Thursday, this was a pretty popular area - for good reason. There were fun trails to traverse and cool little Barton Creek with seasonal swimming pools.



Joe also treated us to Mount Bonnell - also a popular area with fantastic overlooks of the Colorado River (a different one).

 

We ate in, grilling sausages (Whole Foods has surprisingly good and reasonable sausages), and watched many episodes of The Simpsons.

February 17
For some reason, I was resistant to get out of bed (lots of good hiking I guess). We got out for another hike, this time on the Ladybird Lake Trail - really downtown Austin, pretty area and pretty populated.

 

Joe has a convertible and we enjoyed the nice weather with the top down! Big food highlight of the week was our early (before Friday night craziness) dinner at The Salt Lick - legendary barbecue.

Neglected to get a good picture of the meals - excessive leftovers from 'Family Style' dinners and a turkey sandwich

We still managed to consume pecan pie and blackberry and peach cobblers. The rest of the day was food coma.

February 18
I got in my first run since Rocky Raccoon after two weeks off! A little stiff and achy to start, but felt AOK for quite a while - the last ten minutes (after I hit an hour) was a little tougher, but happy for a mostly good jog - even on some trails at Slaughter Creek Preserve. We ended up with a super nice day - 80s!!! Despite it being Saturday and our aversion to crowds, we took another drive in the convertible to the Greenbelt to hike and hang out in the creek.

Can't sneak a picture of Rudy!

 

With sundown and cooling temps, we headed back to Joes, Rudy made some burrito fillings, and we worked on leftovers for dinner. Entertainment was a few HBO stand up comic acts.

February 19
Joe had some work to do for a few hours, so Rudy and I occupied ourselves with a bike ride at Mary Moore Searight Park. Not a ton of trails, a few dead ends and obviously less traveled tracks, but still great to get out!

 

I think it had been three weeks since I had been on the bike! Despite rain in the forecast, we had another nice day with lots of hanging outside. We went out for some classic Austin Tex Mex at Chuy's, pretty delightful.

YUM - veggie enchilada in a blue corn tortilla, and shrimpy chile relleno

Just more hanging out after that.

February 20
Some good storms happened overnight made for a cool, muggy, rainy morning. Sadly, back to work for Joe. Rudy and I went back to the Preserve for some trail running - a little soggy, but manageable. Other than that, shopping, hanging out, and baking of a flourless chocolate cake. Later in the day, Rudy and Joe dove into a little plumbing project. Just cleaned up leftovers for dinner.