Tugboat's Texas Trip - Day 3, Waco, Austin

Day three involves a little more movement. We were done in the Dallas/Fort Worth area and were planning to stop in our third and fourth cities of the Texas Tour. We got up, packed it up and enjoyed a breakfast for free at the hotel. I fell victim to the biscuits and sausage gravy. I'd had some with my country fried steak at H3 the previous day with glorious results but this version was thin and cold. It was not ideal. We planned the day, tossed our checked bags in the truck and dropped our carry-on in the backseat and we got on the move in good time, hoping to arrive in Waco around mid-morning. Our first stop once we got to town was the Dr Pepper Museum and Free Enterprise Institute. This was really the only reason we pulled off the highway and we're very glad we did. We learned about how Dr Pepper got started, how innovation was globally celebrated at one point in history and how driven and dedicated the head of Dr Pepper was. Something about the philosophy of W.W. "Foots" Clements really resonated with the Tugboat. In the gift shop later I'd not only purchase a "I'm a Pepper" magnet for She, a patch for the garment but also a special marble that "Foots" gave out in lieu of business cards. It is marked with his personal slogan: the Golden Rule, that I strive for, "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." I thought having something unique like that instead of a standard business card was also genius. We also enjoyed an expensive soda pop version of Dr Pepper as it would have been decades ago in shops across America. Chef prefers today's version. We also learned about many other soda pop companies and their history as well as the evolution of the industry in general, including a very creepy presentation by a wax man in a reconstruction of the original drug store where Dr Pepper was conceived.  We saw how production and bottling lines worked in the industry's heyday. We also learned about various uses of pop over the decades including as a health elixir, laxative, and a hot beverage. 

Our next destination was more to generate jealousy than any personal need to visit. We walked around the corner and found ourselves entering Magnolia Market at The Silos. It was pretty intense for a HGTV show's hosts' store. You could see the iconic silos from a far way off but we were surprised by the sheer number of people flooding this location. There were all kinds of cops just to keep order here. We wandered around amongst the throngs of women, young and old, all star struck by simply being there. When we got inside and saw the prices of things we turned around and walked right back out. I had ideas of buying a travel mug for Dutchie but those went out the window when I saw the exorbitant price. We walked away admiring the hundred person deep lineup to get into their bakery after 1pm. 

We walked toward downtown to find a spot to eat. There was much debate until we realized my choice was only open late night and we ended up at a 50's Diner called Jake's Texas Tea House. It was fairly unremarkable outside of the pie option. We decided we should see one more part of Waco before moving on. No, it was not that part, it was the River District. We went to a park near the Brazos River and enjoyed some cool sculptures and spent some time on the Waco Suspension Bridge looking down river at McLane Stadium of Baylor University. When we'd had our fill of that we moved on.

Our next city on the trip was Austin. We hadn't realized during the planning process that Austin would be hosting a massive festival while we planned to be there. South by Southwest (SxSW) is crazy big. I don't even understand what it is all about. I know there is a massive music festival, film festival, IT festival, new tech festival, and comedy festival. Those are just the parts I know of. We were told increasingly large numbers of people that the festival attracts over it's duration. The number started at 100k and was over 600k by the time we were ready to venture out. As a result of this influx of people, accommodations were harder to come by, especially affordable ones. We ended up staying in an outer part of the city called Round Rock. Apparently it's a city proper but I don't know how these things work, I'm going to consider it like I do the GTA and call it all Austin. Upon arriving at our hotel we decided we'd take an Uber down to a district called the domain that featured some neat bars and have dinner there. We'd save the drive into the belly of the beast until the following day. We had a 5 star driver and excitedly remarked on all the things that made him awesome once we got out of the car. We wandered into Culinary Dropout and had a good meal and stayed to enjoy the fun atmosphere. After a couple hours and more than a couple beers we walked across the street to the Yard House to take on a yard of beer, despite being pretty full already. As it turned out, you could only get half yards, which was a blessing. Chef guessed a time it would take me to finish mine and he was within a minute, I'd forgotten he was tracking that. We got an Uber back to the hotel and so ended a third big day for the duo.