Friday, August 22, 2008

Weekend Getaway - Final Part

After visiting the Capitol building, we walked down to Sixth Street and had lunch at one of the local restaurants. As we were walking on the sidewalk of Sixth Street, we noticed the dried beer smell coming from the pavement spilled from the night before.

Our last stop was the University of Texas. Cameron and I felt like college students one more time! Walking around the campus brought great memories of our college years (suddenly I feel so old! I can’t believe I’ve been out of school for four years!). The campus is beautiful and you can feel the patriotic long-horn spirit among the students that were there.

Nancy, my mother-in-law, told us to look for a Scripture verse on the university’s bell tower. I’m sure thousands of students walk by it without even knowing that this is the verse in John 8:32 “Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free” (NIV).

Bell Tower - UT Austin:

Look closer (you might want to click on the picture to make it larger): "Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall set you free":

South view from the Bell Tower - Capitol Building:

Sunday morning we visited the botanical gardens close to the Town Lake. We got there early and we pretty much had the park to ourselves. There were all kinds of plants and flowers (we even saw a chile piquin plant!). The oriental gardens were our favorite; they had a beautiful display of ponds with lots of gold fish and coi fish that were two feet long!

The Oriental Gardens:


Grwoing up in the dessert, I thought this little rodent was very cute (Cameron thought it was insignificant):


There was an area dedicated to the butterflies:



This brick wall/window was part of a historical house in Austin:

Visiting our first winery - Texas Hills Vineyard in Johnson City:

You can see the vineyards behind me:



We made a quick stop to buy some home grown tomatoes and squash:

Second winery - Becker Vineyards:


This is their tasting room:


The gift shop is an antique bar originally from the Green Tree Saloon in San Antonio:

Our visit to the nursery - Wildseed Farms:

We also did a little wine tasting:



This picture was taken in Fredericksburg; take a look at the three flags (US, Texas, Germany):

1 comment:

joyce said...

Awesome pictures. Thanks for sharing. Did you see Enchanted Rock? It is close to Fredricksburg.