A Trip to Texas
In March of 2017 I made a spur of the moment trip to San Angelo, Texas. This trip ended up being one of the worst memories, and the best, of my life! I went to Texas to visit an at-the-time Air force boyfriend (I can already hear your judgement, yeah yeah, I know). Although I found out I was one of his many, many, girlfriends, I still had an incredible experience and would love to visit Texas again.
This is not what this post is about. Texas is filled with a certain hospitality you just don’t witness everyday. The people, the food, and my goodness, the views!
San Angelo is a small town about 4 hours away from Austin, Texas. Not to be confused with the very popular San Antonio, TX. I flew by myself, and arrived in a 2 terminal tiny airport, off of a tiny plane. Once I felt the warm wind on my skin and hair, I was in love. When you’re raised in the PNW, you appreciate warmth like that a little differently.
I woke up the next morning and we decided to drive 4 hours to Austin 2 reasons: BBQ & The Hamilton Pool Preserve. We got to Austin early, about 7am and immediately set up our camp chairs outside of Franklin BBQ. Camp chairs? You may ask why those were necessary - let me tell you a story about this unique joint!
Franklin BBQ was created by Aaron & Stacy Franklin. It all started with backyard BBQ cookouts, then turned into a decision to buy a food cart and finding passion in the food that they were making and selling. They started selling their BBQ on the side of a highway in Austin. Today crowds stand in line for hours for a taste of the mouth-watering brisket. Franklin BBQ has been celebrated by everyone from Jimmy Kimmel to President Obama.
When I say that crowds stand in line for hours, I'm not kidding. We arrived at 7am and here were already over 100 people in line. We set up camp and waiting until 11am (when they open). they let people in 10 at a time. Man, we were getting hungry and clearly this place was worth it! Once it was our turn, we were not disappointed! there is a reason these guys are as successful as they are - I'd wait in line everyday for food like that!
We were both in a food coma by the end of this, so we headed to our hotel and took a 4 hour cat-nap. We woke up around dinner time and were hungry once again.
We decided to look up famous restaurants in the Austin area and found The Oasis on Lake Travis - best known for the sunsets. It did not disappoint!
Not only do they have incredible views, they also had fantastic food. Their margaritas were amazing, and dangerously strong. I got the shrimp tacos, fried avocado, and of course, chips & salsa. The whole atmosphere is truly unique and absolutely breathtaking. I would highly recommend you stop here if you plan on visiting Austin.
After enjoying dinner, and a little bit of a buzz, we walked over to a few gift shops and browsed, then we decided we weren’t ready for the evening to end, and went to hike the River Place Nature Trail, about 2 minutes away.
After our wonderful dinner and hike up the trail, we hitched a ride in an Uber to downtown Austin! It was St.Patrick’s day and we were in the mood to have some fun, so we set off exploring. Our first stop was the Jackalope Bar. Yep, you read that right. My dad used to tell me stories about Jackalopes when I was a teenager, it became an inside joke of ours, so I snapped some photos and shared them with him! It was hilarious to witness a bar that literally has a statue of a rabbit-deer as their centerpiece. This thing was ginormous!
I went to order an Irish Trashcan to celebrate St Patty's day and the waitress stared at me in bewilderment. They'd never hear of that before. We shared a piece of pizza the size of our heads combined. Our drinks were Texas sized as well. Food and atmosphere were great and the wait staff was very friendly - I would highly recommend visiting the Jackalope! On to Voodoo donuts - for some goodies to share while stumbling around the streets of Austin!
I am an Oregon native, so Voodoo is something I am familiar with and of course, a huge fan of. If you haven’t been to a Voodoo before, you gotta go! Voodoo features inexpensive crazy doughnut creations, some of their wildest ones are cheeto doughnuts, the classic “voodoo” doll doughnut, complete with raspberry jelly filling and a pretzel stake through the heart, and cereal loaded doughnuts!
My favorite is the “Reeses” doughnut, deliciously simple peanut butter & chocolate.
After finally finding our way home and a long night of adventures, we went to sleep, my head full of anticipation for tomorrow’s plans.
More to come -
= Taylor
