It’s Rodeo Time

There was so much going on last weekend, not realizing there would be a clash, I booked us into the Galveston Mardi Gras fun run.  It is a five kilometer (strange to have the fun-run measured in km despite being an imperial system here) run around the main blocks in Galveston. It is a nice old town with some really grand looking buildings, harking back to a wealthy and genteel time. It does seem a bit run down now though, and the weather again did not help. When I went to Galveston with Ben and Maddy it was super foggy. This time is was a bit rainy and cloudy early in the day. That was ok for the run of course. We were sort of expecting thousands of runners but there were probably less that one thousand and many of them walkers. The streets are cobbled and have tram tracks, so you need to watch your feet. It was fun though and over before it started to get humid and hotter in the afternoon. Not knowing what to expect (traffic and event-wise) I also booked us into one of the “balcony parties”. These are balconies above the parade where you can watch (and drink). In Texas, bars only sell alcohol, no food. So unlike NSW where, in my experience, if you sell alcohol you should have some food available. So, we arrived to watch the parade at lunchtime and the waitress said there was no food available, not even crisps. She also said that we could not bring food into the venue. I knew that would not work for me (I was starving and I’m a light weight) so went back down to the security guy at the door who checked and said I could go out and get something to eat from the food vans everywhere. Italian-sausage-to-share later and we were set up to watch the first or three parades- the golf buggy parade.

We also visited Austin a few weekends ago. Austin is the capital of Texas and a really cool place. It rates itself as the best live music city in the US, with more live music venues than anywhere else. It was freezing Saturday when we drove the couple of hours to Austin. We checked into the tourist information Centre and booked a short highlights of Austin bus tour for later in the afternoon. We then drove to the Capitol building. It is very impressive with a huge dome and lovely mosaics. They have pretty gardens around the building and so when they needed to expand it a few decades ago they went underground. The underground offices and administration actually takes up twice as much area as the on top part but does not interfere with the historic building or the parks. A great idea.

After that we went to a little pub nearby for some lunch and to warm up. (did I mention it was COLD). The bus tour was very informative and run by AO tours and booked through OnceThere. I recommend them. It was a quick overview for orienting yourself and covering a few main points. That evening we went down to 6^th street area to hear some live music. It is winter so I think some of the venues are in recess, but we got recommendations from the tourist office and ended up in a fabulous jazz club called Parker jazz club. It is in the basement of anther club on west 4^th street. The cover charge was reasonable and the food and cocktails yummy. However, the best part was the music. The Ryan Davis trio featured and then Kris the club owner and his wife joined them. Kris played every kind of wind instrument I have ever seen and many I have never seen before. Then he invited Ephram Owens onto the stage (he just happened to be in the club). Owens played (red hot) trumpet. The whole evening was such fun and perfect for a cold night.