Today we took a day trip to the Texas Hill Country with JT’s mom, Margaret.
We left Austin shortly after 8am. Our first stop was Low Water Crossing road near the Lake Travis dam. There was a lot of fog down by the Colorado river crossing on Low Water Crossing road. There were 3 men fishing – 2 on the bridge which clearly said ‘No Fishing’. It was neat to see the fog on the river and the dam in the distance.
We then drove on RM620 for a while towards Johnson City. Many parts of the road were near Lake Travis, so sometimes it was really foggy.
Our first stop was at the LBJ childhood home in Johnson City. We looked at the museum in the NPS building, and then walked along the Settlement Trail to see an old farm. We also saw a longhorn and its calf along the trail.
Our next stop was the LBJ Ranch. We did the self-guided driving tour through the ranch after picking up our free permit from the state park. We got out at the Texas White House and saw Air Force 1/2, but opted to not do the $3 house tour since we had done it on a past visit (and we had plenty left on the day’s schedule).
Next we stopped in Fredericksburg (a touristy German town) for lunch. We split a $20 white pizza at a pizza and pasta place on West Main. Then we wandered up and down the streets for a while, before stopping in a bakery to get some pastries to go. Katie was disappointed the bakery did not have the simple salted pretzels we found all around Germany.
We arrived at Enchanted Rock at 3pm, but there was a line of at least 20 cars on the road before even getting to the Enchanted Rock sign (that were waiting to get in). We finally got in around 3:40pm, at which point we temporarily parked and went to buy our new Texas State Park pass (our Christmas gift from Aunt Lois and Uncle Alan). The pass is $70 a year for everyone in the holder’s car, whereas without a pass we would have paid $21 today ($7 a person).
Once we paid, we moved our car to a real parking spot and took the short hike up the Summit Trail to the summit of Enchanted Rock. After enjoying the summit, we walked down to take the Echo Canyon trail around Enchanted Rock. However, after walking through the canyon (which was a rougher walk than we remembered), we accidentally took a rock climbing trail. As it was getting dark, and we were not halfway around the loop, we decided to return to the car the way we came through Echo Canyon.
We snacked on our pastries on the drive back to Fredericksburg. The banana nut muffin was delicious and moist, while the chocolate filled pastry reminded us of those we bought from grocery stores in Germany. Once in Fredericksburg, we stopped at HEB to get snacks for the trip back to Austin. Our snacks included tres leches cake, energy drinks, fruit, and chips.