Off to Austin

On Sunday, we went to the 9 AM mass at Corpus Christi, with a very mulicultural congregation. The Roman Catholic church says that it is the universal church, and it sure looked universal. A nice mass.

We relaxed around the pleasant and quiet Lakeside campground, enjoying the cool gulf breezes, until the noon check out time. We drove to Austin, and arrived at McKinney State Park around 4 PM. It is hotter here than in Houston, luckily our campsite is shaded by big oak trees. We listened to the cicadas in the evening.

On Monday, we started by driving to the State Capitol. We caught up with a tour guide, who told us that the Capitol in Austin is higher than the US capitol in Washington DC. There are some historically incorrect paintings depicting the events of the Texas war of Independence from Mexico. We had lunch at the Capitol.


We proceeded on to the LBJ Presidential library, which was very interesting. There was a large retrospective of Walter Cronkite's career, as well as many exhibits depicting the turbulent 60's. It struck me that they were playing the music of my youth, including the Jefferson Airplane. Interesting to see a historical presentations on an era that we remembered, instead of an era before we were born. The photo is of one of the pens with which LBJ signed the Civil Rights Act of 1965, one of his most important accomplishments. But of course the good things that LBJ did were overshadowed by the Vietnam War.......

We went over to visit John and Judy for dinner. John is one of the art metal folks that Richard hangs out with on the internet. We had a nice chat and dinner. Interestingly, three of the four of us worked in the electronics business, and ended our working career on or about 2001, during the recession, so we had a lot in common.

On Tuesday we visited the Mexi-Arte museum, which had a special exhibit on the centennial of Mexican independence, lots of photos from the 1910 celebration, which occurred right before the Mexican revolution ousted President Porfirio Diaz. Definitely worth the stop. After lunch at Manual's Mexican restaurant, we headed to the Texas History Museum, which tries to tell all of Texas history in one building. It does a pretty good job, but I wanted more information, so we bought a book.

Wednesday we plan to head for the beach.