Pitterpatterpitterpatter BOOM! … or something a bit like that. These were the sounds we woke up to this morning. In English, a large thunderstorm was our alarm clock – and it was VERY loud 🙂 We were joined by Dewey (the nice cat) and we all sat watching the rain come down through the window.
By the time we’d eaten our breakfast and finished getting ready, the storm had eased off and it was time to head out to discover Austin town… well a part of it anyway! We headed for ‘South Congress Avenue’, a busy street filled with quirky shops, funky restaurants and trendy coffee shops. We were there for quite a few hours, and we didn’t even scratch the surface of the weird and wonderful shopping scene there! We went into two awesome trading post style shops – one was all Mexican day of the dead style bits and bobs, which was filled with painted skulls, colourful arty animals and crazy ornaments! The other was items from all over the world! Both like little treasure troves of cool stuff 🙂
We splashed out on some bits and maybe spent a bit much, but we loved the shops (and their contents) too much to not get anything! Here are some of our photos from South Congress Avenue, and it’s shops today.
We also went into a massive antique shop called “Uncommon Objects”. Don’t think we’ve ever seen a shop which sells so much stuff before! Floor to ceiling with every kind of antique you can imagine, including; stuffed animals, huge old signs, mirrors, wooden dolls, photos, car reg plates, furniture, lighting, a coca-cola fridge…etc. etc. All items were laid out in little boxed sections according to their colour/style etc. so a very well organised and unique antique shop 🙂 All in all a fascinating place – which was worth the trip into downtown alone!
One of the last shops we went in to was a proper cowboy boot store called ‘Allens Boots’. Probably thousands of pairs of boots in there! The whole shop reeked of fresh leather (in a good way of course), and they were all also hugely expensive. That being said, there were plenty of people trying them on – so maybe they were reasonably priced for cowboy boots? Who knows! Here are a few more photos from today 🙂
Now, here’s the thing. Austin is silly hot. On the walk back from grabbing a slice of pizza to the car (about a 10-15 minute walk), we managed to lose half our own body weight in sweat! The humidity is insane – not sure how anybody lives here!! Thank GOD for air conditioning!!
We’ve just been to the cinema – another awesome one too! We went to the ‘Alamo Drafthouse Cinema’. Each couple of seats has it’s own table, complete with pen and paper so that you can place orders during the movie! So you can be half way through the movie, and you don’t have to leave your seat if you want a beer or a burger!! Amazing! We really liked how hot they were on their “no talking” and their “no mobile phones” rules too. Wish cinemas in the UK would adopt such strict rules! Oh.. and the film was good too 🙂
Think we are heading back out into the wild again tomorrow; in the form of swimming and kayaking/canoeing! Looking forward to being able to jump into cool water again once the Austin humidity gets to be too much 😉 We are liking it a lot here! Night all 🙂
eighteenstates 