Valentines Weekend

Thursday night I had my first trip into Austin which is the capital of Texas. It is a university town and is known for its quirkiness.

We were there to see one of my host parents friends perform with an Austin local. Their friend ‘Big Al’ and his wife are from Atlanta and flew in to have harmonica lessons with Jimi Lee who was performing at an Irish Pub on 6^th Street. Sixth Street is well known for its night life and music scene. The night was really fun! Jimi was playing with another man who is from Austria, who has a scholarship with the local university and was this years winner of the music award there. They played like, blues music with a harmonica, acoustic and electric guitar. It was really organic and really good. I got his CD too :). Anyway, I want to go back into Austin to explore. I’ve decided I’m definitely a city girl. I just think they’re exciting and they all have their own feeling or vibe or whatever.

Friday afternoon after school we packed up and went off to the lakehouse where we met up with the friends we went to Austin with the night before. The house is really nice and they have a boat and a deck near the water and a big yard. They keep ensuring me that it is much better in the summer, but it is still pretty right now.

That night we went into San Antonio and visited the Alamo which was once a Roman Catholic Mission and then a fortress during the Texas Revolution but it is now a museum, which was naturally closed when we were there Friday night but I got some pictures of the outside. We also went through a really old hotel near there which had all the old furnishings and decorations. There were also some cabinets with historical items and such in there which was really interesting.

After that we went to the River Walk to have a look. It is quite unique in that the

river is kind of one story below the roads and stuff, not underground, kind of just sunken down. And so there is a pathway around and cafes which line the river, it was pretty but I really want to see it during the day. We didn’t eat there because it was absolutely packed and as it turned out we didn’t have dinner until about 9:30-10pm.

Yesterday for lunch we went to, well, I guess you’d call it like a steakhouse for lunch :P I had a baked potato (they are very popular here). I’ve found Americans like to drown their food either with ‘ketchup’, mustard or cheese and sour cream :P Anyway, the restaurant was kind of cool, it was so ‘Texan’. Instead of trays to put your food on you had like crates and you sat and wooden tables with the long wooden chairs kind of like we had at primary school. So yeah, they were very ‘pro meat’ wearing shirts that said ‘I didn’t claw my way to the top of the food chain to eat vegetables’ and on one wall they had painted on ‘Real people eat meat’ :P All in good fun.