[Malfis]

Could I ask for some help from US Pentaxians.
From September 21st my wife and I are visiting my son and his family who now live in Southlake, near Dallas / Fort Worth.
We intend to do a couple of 4 night Mon/Fri road trips. I am organising one to the Northern New Mexico / Southern Colorado area, but would also like to visit Southern Texas. last year we spent a couple of nights in Fredericksburg and visited San Antonio and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves.
I would be very grateful if I could have some suggestions - should it be Austin or Houston etc.etc. Obviously photographic opportunities are important!
Thank you.

[SpecialK]

I would be very grateful if I could have some suggestions - should it be Austin or Houston etc.etc. Obviously photographic opportunities are important!
Thank you.

I think Austin for food or music (but I passed on that). Houston for the Johnson Space Center, San Jacinto Battlefield and USS Texas battleship. Then Galveston, which has a (formerly flooded) historic neighborhood with sculptured tree stumps, among other things - including air museum, train museum, drilling rig museum, and a ship/submarine park overlooking the beautiful brown water of Galveston Bay.

https://www.nasa.gov/centers/johnson/home/index.html

http://www.sanjacinto-museum.org/

http://www.lonestarflight.org/

The train museum has a lobby full of lifesize human sculptures in various endeavors.

http://www.galvestonrrmuseum.com/

http://www.oceanstaroec.com/museum.htm

http://www.galveston.com/seawolfpark/

http://www.galveston.com/treesculpturetour/

Just north of Houston on the way back to Dallas is the National Funeral History museum, which despite the name is as a professional museum as you will find. Info on presidents and popes, old hearses, and a 3-person casket...

http://nmfh.org/

I did all that last October.

[bertwert]

@Rupert may be able to help?

[paulh]

Hey there. SpecialK hit on some great South Texas attractions. But if you're staying in Southlake, be sure to visit Grapevine right next door. There's a ton of things to see and do here - historic Main Street has lots of restaurants, a vintage railroad that makes daily trips to Fort Worth, all kinds of arts and crafts shops, wineries & lots more. The huge Gaylord Texan Resort right on the lake is worth checking out as well. For an authentic Texican breakfast/lunch, try Old West Cafe. It's usually packed, so come early. Yes, I'm a little biased - I live here Enjoy your trip. http://www.grapevinetexasusa.com/

---

Last edited by paulh; 08-26-2016 at 04:38 PM.

[alamo5000]

Could I ask for some help from US Pentaxians.
From September 21st my wife and I are visiting my son and his family who now live in Southlake, near Dallas / Fort Worth.
We intend to do a couple of 4 night Mon/Fri road trips. I am organising one to the Northern New Mexico / Southern Colorado area, but would also like to visit Southern Texas. last year we spent a couple of nights in Fredericksburg and visited San Antonio and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves.
I would be very grateful if I could have some suggestions - should it be Austin or Houston etc.etc. Obviously photographic opportunities are important!
Thank you.

In a previous job I would drive about 7,000 miles per month all within the state of Texas. I can tell you every kind of possible road trip there is. It just depends on what you want to do, what you want to see, what you enjoy, etc etc.

[alamo5000]

Could I ask for some help from US Pentaxians.
From September 21st my wife and I are visiting my son and his family who now live in Southlake, near Dallas / Fort Worth.
We intend to do a couple of 4 night Mon/Fri road trips. I am organising one to the Northern New Mexico / Southern Colorado area, but would also like to visit Southern Texas. last year we spent a couple of nights in Fredericksburg and visited San Antonio and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves.
I would be very grateful if I could have some suggestions - should it be Austin or Houston etc.etc. Obviously photographic opportunities are important!
Thank you.

Are you looking for a 'we are in the middle of nowhere' kind of a road trip or are you looking for nature, or are you looking more for 'civilization', or are you looking for for vineyards and winery type things, or good food, or heritage things? There is a whole lot of roads in Texas.

Also it depends on how long you have to explore.

From Dallas to Big Bend National Park it's about 8 hours each direction (figure one full day of driving there and one full day of driving back) but you shouldn't miss that if you can help it. You can even stop in Marfa too. LOL

Google "Big Bend National Park" and see if it's something you might like. You could do that in 4 or 5 days from Dallas no problem.

Texas is unique for sure. I used to regularly drive a road that would have about 4 hours of no gas stations and no cel phone coverage. That's 4 hours at 80mph by the way.... they have since put up a cel phone tower out there but you can just wander off in all kinds of directions.

If you want to see cultural things a lot of that stuff is literally a bunch of one horse cowboy towns. One thing I personally enjoy though is taking photos of the court houses in the little towns I visited. Each court house is unique and generally very photogenic.

If you're looking for a lot of urban stuff to do Dallas and Austin areas are good.

You may or may not be a sports fan but I would highly recommend going to Austin on a college football weekend when they have a home game. The 'tailgate party' is something to behold. It's rather huge. Like all of downtown. Think a few hundred thousand people...it's a bunch of fun. If you like the wild side of things then stick around 6th Street in Austin. It's like Mardi Gras. It's full of bars and drunks and hippies and bikers and you name it.

Pretty much if you don't go watch a football game somewhere (doesn't matter where) you're going to be missing the action.

Again though it really depends on your budget and what you enjoy. Personally cities like Houston and Dallas are fine and all, but if you are going there you generally are going to need to go to an 'event' of some type, such as the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo.... but that's not until Spring...

That said you can go find a rodeo in a small town fair and have a pretty authentic time.

Other things you can do is ride horses, shoot guns, fish, hike, camp... the true taste of Texas... there are some things that are indoors or in the city but most of it is in small towns you've never heard of. (I am born and raised in TX, my mom and dad are, all my grandparents, and my great grandparents too) so I am a bit partial....

That said there are a bunch of wineries, lavender farms, and all sorts of things.

Also different parts of the state have little common but also different cultural things. In South East Texas it's near Louisiana so our native type foods are a blend of Cajun, Texas BBQ, and seafood...out in West Texas it's different.

Basically your question equates to 'I'm going to Europe so what should I go do?' LOL!

If you want to keep it authentic though I would go to a small town fair, go to a rodeo, go shoot as many guns as you can, attend a football game, sample a lot of different kinds of food.. if you were here in spring time you could also go to the rattlesnake round up in Sweetwater...

I would also highly recommend using AirBNB. The locals you stay with can plug you into events that you otherwise wouldn't get to experience.

[Malfis]

Thank you all for your help - it's given me plenty to think about.
We're not big city people, much prefer the countryside and historic attractions.