I spent three nights in Austin. It's not so weird. In fact, it is a quintessential college town writ large. If you have been following my travel posts from the past nearly two decades, you know anytime I get to a college town or hipster enclave (Ithaca, Ashville) I start to draw comparisons to Ann Arbor. Austin, while probably four times the size of Ann Arbor, still has the strong vibe of a college town, being the home of the nearly Michigan-sized University of Texas. Throw in its standing as a tech hub second only to Silicon Valley and you get upper middle class hipster paradise.
If Austin was once weird, it is no longer. Food trucks featuring outlandish combinations of flavors are no longer unusual. Dirty 6th street -- kind of like a slightly less psychotic version of Bourbon Street -- is fun and can be crazy, but it's not weird. Bird scooters? Don't make me laugh.
There is an interesting spot called Graffiti Park which is a series of walls that were set to be demolished for condos, but when people started filling them with graffiti it became an iconic landmark and the condos were forestalled. It is actually a pretty cool thing; some of the artists are quite talented, but nothing is sacred. A beautiful panel can be covered by any idiot with a spray can before it even gets seen, with no recourse except of course to repaint over it I suppose. Impressive that it doesn't descend into scatology and the lurid. There is a lot of cool artwork to see and it changes all the time. It qualifies as moderately weird but the weirdness is mitigated because money is money and the real estate is too valuable not to build on. So they are moving it to the outskirts of the city by the airport where it will be at least partially controlled and dedicated to "legitimate" graffiti artists, sanctioned by the government probably. Ah well. Like I said, the weird is gone and the gentry has a firm grip on everything.
Probably the last truly weird thing in Austin is the bats. The Congress Avenue bridge crosses the Colorado river in the heart of Austin. In 1980, it was rebuilt in such a way that there were crevices lining the underside of the bridge. Turns out, bats love crevices. Were you to walk under the bridge during the day, you would have no idea that above your head were in excess of a million bats. Just before dusk, the top of the bridge is covered with hundreds of humans who have gathered to watch the million or so bats emerge in a swarm from below. They flow out like a billowing cloud of smoke that lasts for many minutes as they stream upriver in search of bugs to eat. Very cool thing to see. Recommended, but be advised, bats smell. Bad.
(Aside: I don't think can I count the number of places I have seen the Colorado River. From as far north as Westwater, UT to Lake Havasu, AZ in the south. It would be an interesting project to retrace all my travels through the West and pick out all the stops I've made along the river.)
All this lack of weird doesn't mean Austin isn't a great place to visit. It is. There are tons of things to do and an incredibly energetic vibe anywhere you go. Even a trip to the capitol building is of interest, which would normally be the least interesting thing in the world.
And then, of course, there is the live music. All up and down 6th street and hundreds of other places. Most folks know of the Moody Theatre where Austin City Limits is held -- there is a statue of Willie Nelson out front -- but it's only one of many storied venues.
Endless options for food and drink and music are the core of Austin's particular brand of cool. Still, it is not without its downsides. It is not green, in the sense of verdant. Oh there are parks and greenways and such, but you will never doubt that you are in a major city in the throes of booming building and development. They joke that the official bird of Austin is the crane (Do I have to explain it?).
The bigger problem is the traffic, as you would expect. There are no major freeways that will get you directly to Austin, at some point in your approach you are going to get dumped off onto four lane roads. At that point you better hope you timed things right or you might as well get comfortable. If there is a Longhorns game you might as well get a room at a motel outside town. Driving in the city itself is not much better and parking is a savage beatdown. If there is any place you want to Uber around, it's Austin. Maybe those Bird Scooters make sense after all.
I can understand why Austin is growing like it is. If I was a young tech exec or a student free riding on the 'rents, it would be at the top of my list. It would be a little too intense for me now, given my age and habits, but I do hope to visit again -- maybe catch the F1 race one year or a good Austin City Limits headliner or just snag some interesting food. The energy is infectious.
