Via Norbizness comes this Texas Monthly list of 75 Things To Love About Texas, there for the usual limited time. It's a good idea, I think, to pause occasionally while the Lege is busy doing Lord knows what with school finance and remember why we care in the first place. All lists like these are subjective, and for sure there are things that they did not include that you or I might have (my list would include such things as the Schlitterbahn, the Marching Owl Band, the Art Car Parade, and the David Adickes statue of Sam Houston up in Huntsville, in case you're curious), but this is a fine starting point for discussion and/or trip planning. Check it out.
Posted by Charles Kuffner on April 25, 2006 to The great state of Texas | TrackBackAny list of things to love about Texas that doesn't include either Goode Company or the Salt Lick is incomplete.
Posted by: Sue on April 25, 2006 7:38 AMOnly been here 3 years so far. And I can't get past Bluebonnets on the TM site. But as a parent of 2 young kids these would be on the top of our list so far in no particular order:
1. Fort Worth Zoo (maybe the best zoo in the country and we've seen a lot of them)
2. Cameron Park Zoo in Waco (Awesome zoo for its size, especially the new Brazos River exhibit. I rank it as the 2nd best zoo in Texas ahead of both Houston and San Antonio and behind only Fort Worth).
3. Port Aransas beach vacations (We've only stayed at La Mirage Condos which are fine but we'd welcome other recommendations).
4. Children's Museum of Houston. Best Children's museum in the state, easily. The Children's museums in Austin and San Antonio are OK but not in the same league as Houston. the DFW metro area doesn't seem to have any decent children's museums. The Mayborn Museum in Waco is a quite nice children's and natural history museum and better than anything we've found in the entire DFW area. Yes, the Fort Worth museum of Science and Industry is OK and we're members. But it's not a children's museum.
5. Alamo Cafe in San Antonio. We don't eat out much but that's been the best kid-friendly restaurant we've found so far in Texas.
6. Barton Springs Park in Austin.
7. Cameron Park in Waco (Best urban mountain biking spot east of Utah).
8. HEB and Central Market. You don't know what you're missing until you go home to Oregon and the only grocery choices are Wal-Mart and Safeway.
9. Ruby Red Grapefruit.
Things we miss from the Pacific Northwest and Alaska?
1. Snow and living 20 minutes from the ski slopes.
2. Beaches you can reach without an overnight trip.
3. Cities actually designed for bicycles.
4. Dining outside without mosquito repellent.
5. World-class Asian restaurants. OK, I'm sure Houston has good Asian restaurants. But nothing we've found in Waco or DFW comes remotely close to the average Chinese, Thai, or Vietnamese restaurant in Seattle or San Francisco.
6. Fresh Dungeness crab.
7. The fact that every dinner party and BBQ you go to has fabulous fresh grilled salmon and halibut (OK, that's mostly Juneau and not the Northwest).
8. Scuba diving for king crab and scallops (Another Juneau one).