Austin's Hot Sauce Festival

Vendors from as far as Jamaica  competed in the annual Hot Sauce Festival this weekend. Each vendor entertained guests with blistering and sometimes tasty hot sauces of various types. Hot does not always equal flavorful.

Indeed, the Jamaican sauces, with which we are familiar from island visits, did not stand up to island quality. The booth's Scotch Bonnet Sauce (Scotch Bonnet is a relative of the Habanero pepper), disappointed us by missing the very flavorful pepper taste. We are used to the pepper rings, raw onions, and vinegar (escoveitch) used to anoint freshly fried fish on the beach. This was nothing like it.

Inside the big top, the real competition was going on while we were there. If you wanted to taste and vote, the tent provided a bit of relief from the 97 degree heat. Otherwise, the order of the day was people-watching and music-listening.

At one end of the Waterloo Park venue, the live music prevailed. The band was playing some very nice salsa, accompanied by this woman balancing a flower pot on her head as she danced gracefully.

This couple was getting it done,

entertaining the crowd, and

enjoying themselves doing it. This is not the first time we were jealous of the dancers.

It all starts with the good music, of which there seems no end in Austin.

August in Austin

Late summer is beautiful here, hot and dry, with a flawless sky and wild flowers. But it is sad in a way, too. Today we took along the Barton Creek "greenbelt". Barton Creek runs through South Austin and on into town at Zilker Park. The trail winds and winds alongside the creek, shaded by limestone cliffs, trees, and shrubs.

In August the creek is completely dry. Here a lonesome rope swing allows you to drop onto stones, instead of a shady pool.

The bed doesn't show even a puddle. The white and light tan limestone reflects the morning sun into your eyes.

The cliffs and caves do not show even a seep.

The falls that usually fill a big pool stand dry and stark.

All the work people do to stem the flow at the other end of the pool looks a bit silly at this time of year.

There are still fruits and colors to be seen, catching the eye of runners, hikers, bikers, dogs, and families. But the music of the water is gone.

Out with the mad dogs and Englishmen

103F in the shade. What were we thinking? Off to the Batfest we went, regardless of the heat. The Batfest is Austin's annual tribute to their bat population. The bats live in the underparts of the Congress Street Bridge, emerging every evening to the "Oohs" and "Ahhhs" of the crowd.

To get there we parked along Lady Bird Lake, then walked along the lake path to the bridge. Under the 1st Street Bridge was an unexpected collection of Cypress knees. Though there are Cypress trees all along the lake, we did not know the knees would emerge in shade far from the nearest tree.

We could see our target in the distance. Even in the shady path we were already experiencing the effects of the heat. As we get older this has more and more of an effect on us. My reaction is to just slow down until I can maintain a pace without fainting.

Apparently the past Batfests have had name bands, but this year not so much. The music is still good. It ranged from a Latino band with geezer soundboard support to heavy metal at the other end of the bridge.

We saw only one of these misting fans. They are fairly common down here, where the air is quite dry. They really work!

Most of the booths were boring food, jewelry, and clothing booths. This was one of the more interesting things to see. Kids must want to puke. Three axes of spin will do it!

These limestone wine/towel racks were kind of interesting, but way too expensive to buy.

And that was it, one trip across a long bridge with no shade. Even the mad dogs and Englishmen had given up, and Batfest had hours to go.

With the decline of bats in the Northeast, it is nice to see how much Austin loves its own colony.

More natural beauty in Texas

We put our new Texas State Park Pass to good use yesterday, visiting Pedernales Falls State Park (PFSP), near Johnson City. PFSP is a really big park, with areas devoted to sightseeing, youth outings, RV/tent camping with facilities, wilderness-style camping, picnicing, swimming, and hiking. It is located in the hill country, so there is quite a bit of up and down in its enjoyment.

This was our first view of the falls itself. While dry right now, the falls is subject to flash flooding. There were lots of warning signs - do not panic, just leave everything behind and get out. We had looked at the park web site, but after this view we really appreciated the scale of the falls. It is really wide. The flash flood pictures took on a whole new significance.

Even in this dry August, the river had enough flow to make the falls interesting.

On the walk down to the river we saw plenty of these critters. They would scurry along, then perch on a rock and wiggle their tail tips. The tips (not caught here) had what appeared to be blue stripes. The effect of the wiggling was to draw attention to the tail, maybe as a diversion for predators. I couldn't spot one like it on the net, so it will remain Wiggly Tail lizard to me.

Down at the bottom we found more Cypress trees. I can't get enough of these. They were just beautiful. Something about their tapered shape really appeals. Amidst the dryness of the hills they were unexpected.

Here the better half was enjoying one of our favorite activities, stomping around in rocks near the water. The fact that this is an overall dry place added to the pleasure. It was really interesting how the Cypress roots grew along the ground, searching for reliable water.

There always is something new and different on these hikes. Here we saw blossoms on small trees growing out of the sand at the bottom of the canyon. The bright colors are beautiful.

The falls itself is home to a wide variety of potholes and water "veins."

Here, better half conveys a bit of scale.

The "veins" had areas where the water, as it passed, had hollowed out beneath the surface of the rock.

This one substantial rivulet was delivering lots of water to the pools below.

Huge rocks had been moved by the floods and lodged in cracks.

No matter where we climbed, it seemed, there was always something more to see. Eventually the heat got to us. It drained our energy (and our water bottles) quite a bit. We were forced back to the car to find other parts of the park to investigate.

This was a bit of the swimming area. More rocks, more Cypress, and just a few people. Getting here also included a substantial down component. By this time, the up component required quite a few rest stops along the way.

There was one thing we did not get to see, the "trammel" crossing. Trammel means hindrance, among other things. I am guessing that this may be a place that rock formations squeeze the flow. Maybe in the fall/winter we will go back and cross to the other side, where there are some hiking trails.

We took a back road on the way back to Austin. In the hill country there seems to be a convention that country roads, when crossing a stream, are built fairly low (without a bridge). Culverts divert normal water under the road, but it seems expected that flash floods will go over the road. Most of the dips have warning signs. Many have flood level measurement devices.

As we went back we passed a place where the Pedernales River crossed beneath the road. Here, as we drove across the one lane crossing, we saw one of our old friends from Chincoteague, a blue heron. It patiently stood still while I took a picture out the car window. You can see how close to the water level we were at this point.

Texas seems to abound with these gems. We hope to see more of this one and many more, as well.

Heat index 109

Early days of August here in Austin are scorchers. It is a nice dry heat, but our morning walks leave us wringing wet. We try to walk for an hour or so around the neighborhood every day. It is good for us, but painful, at times.

A better alternative sometimes is to find one of Austin's many green areas and take Slobber Dog (Pepper) for a walk. The other day we spent a bit of time at Bull Creek. It is a beautiful limestone creek with a bunch of trails and frequent splash spots.

There are lots of pretty little falls along the way. The parking situation is generous, and there are restrooms, too.

Be forewarned, though. You need to bring plenty of drinking water, even if you sit in the stream. All the limestone seems to suck the moisture right out of you.

This is a great family and dog place. Slobber Dog, on the left, meets a pipsqueak here.

A bit farther downstream is another shallow spot with low falls. We thought we were lucky to find running water at all.

Later on in summer Barton Creek dries up. We thought this one might be, but for a bit of rain in the last couple of weeks.

We are finding life in the deep South very enjoyable. As we continue to search for a house, we are thankful every day that we are here.