Hotels By City: Cheap Hotels, Hotel Guides & Hotel Blogs

I don't know how many of you out there are nerds like myself, but Austin is filled with some very excellent places to go and stick your nose in a book, if you so desire.

The most obvious choice - and the origin of the pun in this post title - is BookPeople, a simply excellent bookstore on N. Lamar. BookPeople has Austin-y and Texas-y stuff, a cafe, and ...

If one is currently staying near downtown, or even if one takes a taxi, rents a car, or takes a bus, there is a day hike that captures the most public aspect of the city.

This is room for arguement, for I would exclude a great part of South Austin, but certainly not South Congress. One could do well starting here.

There are fascinating shops on South Congress. Window shopping provides enough ...

If you are looking for great coffee to start your day - stop at Austin Java (http://www.austinjava.com). I had a FABULOUS Mint Julep coffee today.  And another thing --- it served my consience well too b/c they offer Organic and Fair Trade coffees!  But what's even better to us locals is that Austin Java fresh roasts its coffee in Austin, Texas.  Try them out!

Though sprawling well beyond the sense of a 'town lake', one could describe Austin's core identity as a town by a lake. The sprawl has connected the artificially created Lake Travis (almost all the lakes in texas are artificial) to the city center. But Austin has always had a water culture, for a river, also damned, divides the North from South Austin. The vast settling in the areas further from ...

While visiting Austin saunter down SoCo. or South Congress to get some of the best Mexican food around.  Whether you are looking for kickin margaritas or authentic dishes check out these fabulous local eateries:
El Gallo Restaurant
2910 S Congress Ave (Cross Street: Oltorf Street)
Austin, TX 78704
(512) 444-6696
http://www.elgallorestaurant.com/ 
and
Guero's Taco Bar
1412 S Congress Ave (Cross Street: Gibson Street West)
Austin, TX 78704
(512) 447-7688
Personality and authentically Austin for dining and cuisine.  On Saturdays, locals walk down ...

Remember when toy stores were actually toy stores, and were filled from floor to ceiling with goodies that you really wanted to play with? They still exist here in Austin, and my favorite is KidGenius Toys just south of the river (1706 south Congress).

South Congress has long been home to a host of insteresting stores for all kinds of wares, from jerky to guns, cars to ...

Austin, the capital of Texas, has many cultural and environmental attractions. Some are hard to find, others obvious. It a pretense of this post to refer you to one and then another, a common conventional attraction, and an uncommon, not typical and perhaps intimate attraction.

Of course, many of these things are seasonal!

One thing many do not do is visit the capital building itself. Politics, and political culture thrives in Austin. ...

Let me start out by getting a few things straight right off; first, not all sports bars are the same. Second, only in Austin will you find a sports bar with a historic past. And third, and most importantly, The Tavern is Air Conditioned. Even says so right on their sign.

Native Austinites like myself have long known the sign of ...

If you are looking for a great place to spend the day wandering from thrift shop to antique store to high quality resale, you'll want to go check out the shops on Burnet Road.

My absolutely favorite resale store in Austin is the Next-To-New Shop of St. David's Episcopal Church. They have an amazing variety ...