Dave’s Parents Visit
Austin (The Visitation – Day Three, 1 April 2006)
Lee had really wanted to go to Wimberley, so because of
that Mum felt that Saturday would be
the day to go, so Lee could spend time with us.
We’d also learned this was the first weekend for the Wimberley Market
Days, so we could check that out before stopping at the Pie Company.
Wimberley Market Days was a bazaar of cubby holes, half of
which were crafty things and the other half were flea market things. I didn’t eat breakfast that day because I’d
eaten a big dinner the night before and I expected to nibble as I went
along. Lee located a dealer who dealt
with Adirondack chairs that she had been
looking for the backyard. We got some
coconut-covered pecans there, but that was about it as we only spent an hour
there. We only visited a small portion
of the event, but easily could’ve spent the entire day there.
A quick hop across town brought us to the Wimberley Pie
Company. I had brought a large
cooler-bag in order to hold her two pies (cherry and apple). Everyone got a slice of pie, which we enjoyed
on the front patio. I also bought two
bags of cookies to nibble on later.
There wasn’t a direct route from Wimberley to Gruene, so I plotted a
route westward which ended up being via Canyon Lake Austin ).
Gruene is spelled that way and pronounced “Green” because
of the influence of the German immigrants.
Gruene had a Dance Hall where some Country Music stars had gotten their
starts, and Chaz had previously
described it as a nice little historical place.
There wasn’t much history, as opposed to lots of little tourist shops
(like the boulevard at Lake George ). The lunch at the Tea Room was really good.
Going in and out of the shops was cool, but I could tell
that Dad wasn’t all that interested in the shops. Mum
and Lee stopped at the local winery and had a couple trial glasses of wine, as
Dad and I checked out the imported beer selection (which was more of a token
selection). After some nibbleage at some
more shops, we went back to the Gruene
Dance Hall Mum and Dad watched the band inside, while Lee and I
went outside were the music wasn’t as over-poweringly loud. The Dance Hall has been in continuous use for
many years, and it was basically just a large pull-barn. The lobby had a lot of signed pictures of the
artists that played there (much the way the Parting Glass did), but many of the
artists I didn’t know.
Leaving Greune and heading back northward, because we’d
been out walking in the warm sun for a bit the decision was made to bypass San
Marcos this time (as Mum commented
that she could hit it next trip down). Once
at the hotel, we figured out what dinner would be. We went to Brick Oven, which was an Austin original eatery
that I’d wanting to try for a little while.
We each had our own pizza, which was very good. I had my only beer of the entire weekend.
Dave’s Parents Visit Austin
We worked our way downtown to the Austin Duck
Adventure. Since it was going to be an
hour delayed because of a marathon in Austin ,
I took them up and down a couple blocks of Sixth Street just to say they’d been
there. The Duck Adventure drove around Austin and pointed out
various historical buildings and some interesting areas. At one point the tour goes into Lake Travis
above the dam for Town
Lake Austin
that I hadn’t seen before, and pointed out specific things to Mum (as well as a couple of other tourists) as they
went by.
The driver of the Duck Adventure was either brand new or
the vehicle he was using was very old, because he kept grinding the gears when
shifting. The driver also ground the
gears quite a bit going from land-mode to water-mode and vice-versa. Dad though sure the transmission was going to
get dropped on the street. Everyone on
the Duck Adventure was given a duck bill-like noise maker, which Mum planned to blow frequently while at lunch. The last time Mum
and Dad were in Austin
they went to Shady Grove to lunch, which ironically was the first time Dave had
been there too; and Mum wanted to eat there again.
After lunch, we journeyed up to the Capitol building so Mum could look at some of the statues and monuments
that she didn’t get to see the last time (specifically the Ten Commandments
statue). As it was getting hot, we
decided to get refreshments at Whole Foods.
Target refreshments were smoothies.
Whole Foods was the Austin-based natural foods store which has a nice
patio for loitering. We sat out and
enjoyed the smoothies, and blew our Duck whistles as the Duck Adventure vehicle
drove by (but there were no passengers).
We relaxed a bit more for the evening. No one was hungry, so there was no need to
get dinner. Mum and Dad had to pack
their things, as they had a noon flight out of Austin the next day. It was the ending of a great visit.
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