Totally Texas -- Last minute vacation destination: Austin

How to squeeze in a vacation as the kids’ return to school nears? Make it a weekend, if possible a long weekend, to some of the Texas attractions within easy driving distance.

Traveling without family last month, I combined a trip to Austin for a writing conference with sightseeing between classes and craft panels. I arrived the evening before the annual ArmadilloCon, wondering what tourist destinations I could hit that wouldn’t leave me too groggy for an early morning writing workshop the next day. My choice¾ the state capitol building at 11^th Street and Congress Avenue. I joined the surprising number of visitors who stroll the grounds of our quirky pink granite capitol building once daytime heat gives way to more bearable nighttime temperatures.

Parking was easy, streetside just outside the capitol grounds. The building‘s lighted exterior looks charming at night, there are plenty of easy to walk paths through the grounds, with their collection of native trees and collection of statues and monuments. Before the evening visit, I’d thought of the capitol building as dominating the downtown Austin skyline. But the capitol’s lawns are great places to view the rest of the skyline, including the, if possible, even quirkier Frost Bank Tower with its lighted crown of shard-like glass.

For directions and visiting information, I liked www.real-austin-texas.com/texas-state-capitol.html/.

Then it was off to our family’s favorite book store, the independent BookPeople, at 603 North Lamar. Its shelves are hung with handwritten notes of recommendation from staff members that helped me pick out the graphic novels my eight-year-old grandsons now love to read. For more information, see
www.bookpeople.com/. Although the bookstore has its own café, next to a magazine rack with a mouthwatering array of periodicals, it’s also across the street from a Whole Foods market where you can read and eat inside or out.

The big find on this trip was the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center, 4801 La Crosse Avenue, on Austin’s southwest side. I’d been to the Wildflower Center years before, but it’s grown amazingly since. And not a moment too soon, with suburban development just across the street. Lady Bird Johnson (in public life, Mrs. Lyndon B. Johnson), headed campaigns to beautify her state and the country during her husband’s terms as president.

Thanks to her, Texas highways are now homes to native plants and wildflowers. The center she founded is now administered by the University of Texas. Radiating off a central courtyard, it includes a viewing tower, child-sized educational playroom, gardens landscaped with Texas wildflowers, and trails through an arboretum of native trees. Except for the viewing tower, area generally are accessible to strollers and wheelchairs. New this year is the Luci and Ian Family Garden, with a shade house, small stream, grotto, and children’s play area.

The Wildflower Center is open 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday through Sunday. Tickets are $9 for adults, $3 for children ages 5-12, free to children aged four and younger. Discounts are available for students and adults age 65 and older. Free onsite parking. There’s an onsite café, or bring your own meals and snacks to eat on the shaded picnic tables. For more information, directions, and special events, see
www.wildflower.org/.

On previous Austin visits with children, my family has also enjoyed Zilker Park, home to Barton Springs Pool, (see “Sixty-eight degrees of cool,” at this site, August 1, 2011) and the nightly emergence of resident bats from under the Congress Street bridge, (“Going batty in Austin,” June 13, 2011.)

(Next Friday, more vacation destinations less than a day away)

Totally Texas -- Our wonderful pink Capitol

Texas State Capitol

1100 Congress Avenue, Austin

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I arrived in Austin during a motorcycle convention. For much of the drive from Dallas I’d marveled at the numbers of motorcycle riders. Some wore protective gear , others only wore enough to avoid ticketing for indecent exposure -- apparently preferring a quick death in case of accident to a slow broil under the Texas sun.

At check-in, the staff at my hotel handed me a flier that explained things, including an offer to wash the chrome on my motorcycle -- if I had one -- for free. The Writers League of Texas was holding its convention the same weekend as the Republic of Texas motorcycle rally, with more than 45,000 motorcycle enthusiasts expected to attend. And I thought downtown Austin was just crowded because it was the weekend.

I didn’t expect to meet any bikers on a quick sightseeing tour at the state capitol. For those of you not from here, the first thing you’ll notice about the beautiful state capitol of Texas is that it’s pink. Pale dusty pink, sunset pink, rosy almost-red. Depending on the light, the season, the time of day. Built predominantly of pink Central Texas granite, its appearance seems incongruous for a state so concerned to with its macho image. But a picturesque couple asked for my help. The woman explained that holding her camera -- also pink -- at arm’s length just didn’t give a good enough of view of them. They let me take a picture for myself as well, with the beautiful pink dome in the background.

At the time of its late nineteenth-century construction, the capitol was said to be the seventh largest building in the world. That seemed like quite a feat for a state still recovering from the cost of being on the losing side in the Civil War. Not to worry, the state legislators said. We’ll just trade land for it.

And trade they did. The builders got more than three million acres of land in the Texas Panhandle, which became the largest cattle ranch in the world, the XIT. The famous brand -- “Ten in Texas” -- I learned as a schoolchild, refers to the fact that the ranch included all or part of ten counties.

The capitol has undergone several renovations, with the most recent extending underground to avoid competing with the historic façade. It is open for free tours daily except on Thanksgiving, Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, New Year’s Day and Easter. Please see the Texas State Preservation Board’s site, www.tspb.state.tx.us/spb/ for specifics.

(Next Monday -- After this Capitol Fourth, July’s Totally Texas focuses on ways to beat the heat, starting with the Dallas Museum of Art’s reduced price attractions )