Wildflower roads.
West of Austin is Texas “Hill Country,” known for its gently rolling hills and, in the springtime, its proliferation of wildflowers. Bluebonnet is the state flower, and it’s especially revered by Texans, who are often seen posing amid roadside patches in their Sunday best. We hit Hill Country at the peak of bluebonnet season. But there are dozens of other wildflowers scattered along the roads as well. Orange Indian paintbrush, yellow black-eyed susans, red clover, coreopsis, and so much more. As we drove on winding roads over fresh green hills, Bessie gave us a panoramic view of the most spectacular array of flowers lining the road.
On Saturday, after our evening at the Burnet Bluebonnet Festival and a morning thunderstorm, we took an hour drive down to Fredericksburg, stopping along the way to photograph wildflowers.
Fredericksburg
We’d heard a lot about this town, which was established in 1846 by German immigrants. It’s a popular tourist destination now, with its restored historic downtown filled with shops and restaurants. Tourists aside, it’s got a lot of quaint and was very picturesque to explore.
Timber pioneer home.
We started with the Pioneer Museum. Just $5 gave us access to several acres of historic local homes and barns, dating back to the 1880s. It was fun to wander on our own through the “village,” and each structure was filled with interesting antiques and information, including motion-sensor audio narratives by descendants of the original homeowners.
Drawn by a live musician in a courtyard, we went to Hondo’s for lunch. This is an extremely popular lunch place where you stand in line to order your food (for us about 20 minutes). It’s not fast food, though. In fact, we were raving between bites of our pulled pork, fried chicken breast, and smashed potatoes with ancho chili gravy.
To walk off our heavy lunch, we hiked the Ladybird Johnson Nature Trail, out by the airport. Then we came back to wander downtown and poke around in shops.
Enchanted Rock
Enchanted Rock.
This state park is so popular that it regularly closes its gates mid-morning on weekends and only opens them again later in the afternoon after the crowds have thinned. The “enchanted rock” is a gigantic granite mound that offers a 360° view of the hill country below. Most people tackle the 30-minute hike to the top, and I’ve taken that hike before. But we were just making a quick stop on our way back from Fredericksburg. We took the lower loop instead, which offered plenty of stream-hopping opportunities and cactus/wildflower fields.
Beachcomber RV Park
“Can Gypsy come out and play?”
This was a kind of funny little RV park that I found in my Passport America list for only $15 a night. It’s right on Lake Buchanan and has full hook-ups and a dock. Not to mention a pig pen with two sows and a dozen suckling pigs. Half the small park is full-time RV residents. The other half were weekenders, like us, and we ended up next to a large multi-family gathering of tenters that partied late into both nights. They had a gaggle of small children that were fascinated by us, and our big RV with a TV and everything, and our big dog and funny leash cat. By the time we were packing up to leave, their parents had given up trying to holler them home, and the kids swarmed around the RV with questions about every task. (“Your poop goes in that tube?”) We didn’t mind much, though, because they were awfully cute.