Odd Places

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Monday is a lovely partly cloudy, sometimes sunny warming day. Judy and I explore the Barton Creek Green Belt in the morning and in the afternoon we three take a drive to the south west to see some of the interesting places we've discovered outside of Austin.

There's a huge Hindu temple and complex outside of town that's well worth a visit. The Radha Madhav Dham, Hindu Temple is just South West of Austin TX. Nearby is the Wizard Academy (totally not a cult!) with the tiny, but free, Chapel Dulcinea wedding chapel set on the hill side near the Wizard Academy Tower. On the weekends there's a crowd funded whiskey place where you can try bourbon tastings. On this Monday there's nothing much happening at all. Weddings are on the weekend as is the tasting. But you can wander the grounds, visit the chapel, have a peek at the tower and admire the sculptures scattered about.

We were going to take a drive down to Wimberley (we've never been but understand it's a nice town to visit) and on the way stopped at the Driftwood ghost town (Ok, it's not really a "ghost town" but there's really nothing there). That's Judy and Kate in the picture above on the verandah of the closed general store in Driftwood.

Further on we bumped into the Driftwood Estate Winery around closing time but managed to get in for one of the last tastings. They have a goodly long list of wines to taste, mostly reds, and we tried a few. They're not cheap but are worth trying. Oddly they actually grow some of their own grapes! The winery is on a hilltop with 18 acres of vineyard in the valley below -- the land down there would be tillable, up here on the hillside it's all rock. They irrigate their grapes. Of the wines we tasted, we were most impressed with the sangiovese and the syrah. Both were quite drinkable now, I don't think they're age worthy though.

We never made it to Wimberley. Instead we went to Hays City Store for what we've seen advertised as a 7:00 show by W. C. Clark -- he's an older blues player we've seen before. He plays solo somewhere almost every night and has been doing so for years. We arrive at 6:30 and his show is already underway. He wraps up shortly after 7:00 so it's good we arrived early.

Hays City Store is out in the country at a crossroads -- why it's called a "city store" beats me. There are a couple of good sized buildings -- one seems to be more a bar, the other seems more of a restaurant. There's a large outdoor patio area (under more live oaks) with tables and table service -- that's where the show is on a small stage so that's where we are.  It's chilly out there but they have table top propane heaters to warm the immediate area. It helps. It would be much nicer on a warm night.

The Hay City store is advertised as a "gastro-pub" (in the same manner that it's advertised as a "city store"). Judy has an enchilada dinner, Kate has some shrimp (she's always keen on fresh gulf shrimp), and I have a steak. The food is pretty good, nothing too exciting and not what I'd expect of a "gastro-pub". That's just some creative advertising.

Anyways, a fun day for all of us.