zimmers in texas

well it has been quite a while since we last "blogged" hasn't it. We haven't travelled anyway since our trip to New Mexico but we have more plans.
We had a few friends over the other Saturday night and treated them to a lovely lamb roast. The smell of the lamb all over the Acoma Pueblo had me craving roast lamb so I was on a mission. The problem is that you cannot buy lamb in the supermarket and I had to find a speciality shop to buy any. As it turned out it was exported from Australia and it was the biggest leg I have seen. It was de boned so we had enough for dinner with visitors on Sat night, cold lamb Sunday night, lamb sandwiches Sunday and Monday and lamb fritters on Monday night and lunch on Tuesday. I don't mind if I dont have lamb again for a while. Dinner was very nice with usual confusion over speaking American and Strine made even harder after the consumption of some good old Aussie wines.
On Sunday we visited the Bob Bullock museum which is a 3 storey museum showing the history of Texas from the Spaniards and Indian through to the discovery of oil. It really showed the difference since oil was found.
I have experienced more retail therapy and am still seeing things I am gobsmacked at. Two weeks ago I went to the mall with a friend to buy our Fall shoes. Apparently you have to have four or five different pairs of shoes for each season and it was time for the Fall purchase. I bought a nice pair of suede boots but they are not the cowboy ones so the cowboy boots may have to become part of my winter collection.
Apparently we all have to decorate our houses for the Fall and this is part Halloween, part Thanksgiving and part autumn leaves. Even the supermarkets have Fall decorations out the front. Our local has bales of straw and pumpkins decorating the whole front of the shop. To find our decorations we went to a shop called Garden Ridge and my friend bought a wreath for the front door and little pack of decorations to glue on to it. These are all in autumn colours and they group packs of pumpkins and corn etc. Garden Ridge is a bit like Garden Way only about 50 times as big. One area was completely Christmas decorations and another was Halloween then there was the Thanksgiving area. As well as these themes there was just the usual run of the mill furniture and decorations.
As you can imagine everyone is very big on decorating the outside of the house as well as the inside and there were things that looked like giant snow domes with ghosts and goblins for Halloween and Santa for Christmas. They were the biggest decorations I have ever seen. Another friend from work lent me some cute little Indian decorations to celebate Thanksgiving so I can put them on display in November.

Last weekend was the Austin City Limits festival which is a bit like Woodford with bands from all over coming to perform. We couldn't get tickets but apparently there was a band called Green Card with a few Australian members. They were reported as being very good.
We went to see Mt Bonnell which offers views of the Colorado River and Austin city. It really is a very pretty city. We went out to an Italian Restaurant and then on to a bar to listen to a blues singer with a couple from work. The singer had a fantastic voice but was rather drunk so it was a bit ordinary.

This weekend is the Old Pecan St festival. Pecan st is now called 6th and they block it off for miles and everyone sets up stalls with craft and food and drink. The majority of stall were jewellery but they had a whole range of things including hats and scarves for dogs that were all Texas Longhorn designs (this is the local footy team). Everyone (and his dog) wears Longhorn gear especially now the footy season has started. There were lots of food stalls selling aligator on a stick, pulled pork, brisket and a whole range of food I have never heard of. It was 98 degrees and very hot so we made a detour to an airconditioned bar for a cool drink and then headed out to a Mexican restaurant for dinner.

I celebrated my birthday last week and the TV station was very obliging by starting the new season of Grey's Anatomy and played a 2 hour session. It was great and the next night was Desperate Housewives. I went out to Outback for lunch and was talked in to trying a blooming onion. These taste better than you would think but I can't really see it catching on in Oz. Glenn bought me a digital photo frame so I have loaded my photos and now can see heaps of them, dont you just love technology.

We were planning on a trip to Mexico a few weeks ago but were not sure about the best place to go as various sources warned us against the border but we have now found a nice border town and are planning on a visit next weekend. We have now booked to go to Sth Dakota on 21st oct to see mount rushmore and Rapid City so until then Buenos Notches.

Sky City. Amazing little Indian settlement (peublo) on top of this mesa. It's bigger than it looks here. Been there for thousands of years apparently.

We stumbled across a Indian ceremony taking place which was fantastic - but we weren't allowed to take any photos which was a pity.







Funny parking meter system in Albuquerque. You either put coins in the slot or stuff notes into it with a little 'stuffer' that hangs on the side. They come around and open the back up a couple of times a day and if your little box hasn't got $2 in it your done.

I cant think of any songs about Albuquerque.













Later that day we caught the 'tram' (pictured at the top) up the local mountain. I was still dressed in my shorts and shirt. How was I to know the local mountain was 11500 ft above sea level (Kosciuszko is 7500 ft).

Nearly froze a few things off.

I now own a very warm New Mexico windcheater. The gift shop was doing a roaring trade in them.

The heat wave has finally broken and this weekend the weather has been below 100 degrees for the the first time since we arrived. It is nice to wear a jumper for a change.
Last weekend we went to the Alamo Drafthouse which is a movie theatre where you sit in wide rows and the you can order food and drinks and there are no babies allowed. We went to see Point Break but the difference was that there were 3 comedians who talked over the movie and made smart comments about the show. It was very funny and there was even a guy in the audience who was an extra from the original movie so we all had to cheer when his part came up. They really do have interesting entertainment here in Austin. Last weekend was the Annual Bat Festival where they block of the bridge into the city and have stall etc all along the road and at night everyone watches the bats fly out from under the bridge to feed. Unfortunately for us we missed the festival as we flew out to New Mexico.
There is the choice of 3 long term carparks Austin airport. One is under cover parking, one is walking distance and the third is with shuttle bus to the airport from the carpark. We chose the 3rd option and then had to catch the shuttle to the airport. Since the London security scare the queue to book in luggage has doubled and the kerbside check in was quicker so we just left our luggage at the kerb for them to handle. With South West airlines ( which is what we flew) you can book in over the internet but you dont get a seat allocated. What happens is you get allocated a boarding group which determines when you can board the plane. When you get to your gate you then queue behind your letter (A, B or C) and if you are first in A group you get to choose any seat you like except they let people with babies and/or disabilities on first. Apparently the real advantage of getting in the A group is that there will be enough overhead space for your carry on luggage. The staff are quite casual and the uniform is shorts and runners which seems very sensible to me. Much easier for the hosties to walk down the aisle to deliver our drinks.
We had a short stop over in El Paso but were not able to get off the plane. Of course Glenn had to sing El Paso by Marty Robbins.
We arrived at Albuqurque and then had to catch a shuttle to the Hire Car bookings it was so far away. We drove to the Old Town and parked in the cutest little parking lot. It cost $2 for the day but the parking meter consisted of a row of little boxes with coin slots which you had to put your money in. If you only had notes they had a "stuffer" to stuff the notes down into the box.
Old Town is full of craft shops selling mostly Indian or Mexican goods and foods. New Mexico is famous for its Hatch chilli and the big question is "red or green" which refers to the colour of the chilli you want. My preference would be neither but when in Rome......so we managed to burn out mouths a bit. We had a great Mexican lunch, much nicer than TexMex and looked at lots and lots of adobe houses.
After lunch we drove out on Route 66 to the Acoma Pueblo which is the village of the Acoma Inidians. They still live here and as luck would have it we stumbled upon a religious ceremony. The Acoma Pueblo is the highest pueblo in the USA and it is built on the top of a mesa We walked to the top as the shuttle had hour long queues. Because of the festival it was very crowded and they had heaps and heaps of stalls selling turquoise and silver jewellery, acoma pottery and roasted lamb and corn stalks. The smell of roast lamb pervaded the whole area and it reminded me of the good old Aussie lamb roast. Each of the Indian tribes have their own distinctive style of pottery and the Acoma has a black and white geometeric design so of course we had to buy a small sample.
That afternoon we took a cable car ride up to the top of Mt Sandi which is 11,000 feet above sea level and 34 degrees (Farenheit that is) at the top. It is the longest aerial tramway in the world and took 14 minutes to get up to the top.
We stayed in a lovely bed and breakfast on Sat night and had a great breakfast before heading off to Santa Fe which is about 60 miles north.
The trip didn't take very long at all as we drove on the Interstate at 75mph all the way. There was a big Indian market day in the Plaza when we arrived so we visited more interesting little stalls selling jewellery and pottery. We took a tour of the town and the guide told us that the stalls are only available to genuine Indian traders and they must be certified before they can sell. This all sounded very interesting until we came across a stall selling Aboriginal diggeredoos and CDs of the music.
I was fascinated by all the adobe houses but Glenn thought they were boring. Apparently there are only two styles that can be built in Santa Fe and the buildings can be painted any one of the 40 shades of brown allowed. The new houses are called Santa Fake as they are built from plywood coated stucco to give the adobe look and all the rich Californians are buying up big and pushing the prices up. The desert looks a bit like the area around Alice Springs, all reddy brown with green tussocks dotted over the landscape. The big difference though is the mountains and the mesas.
We visited a couple of museums during the weekend and learnt a lot about Spaniards, Mexicans and Indians. We spent Sunday night in Santa Fe and headed back to Albuqurque on Monday morning. We pulled of the I25 at a small town and noticed they were advertised a new Hyatt. I will be very interested to see what this looks like as it will be brown and flat. All along the highway are dotted Indian reservations and because of some law that says no tax has to be paid on revenue on the reservations there are huge casinos built on them. It looks weird because there is nothing around for miles and then you will see these huge casinos out in the middle of nowhere.
We reversed the process with all the shuttle buses and planes at Albuqurque and arrived safely back to a much cooler Austin. The more we pack to go away the more disorganised we become so this time we forgot the camera. Don't worry we bought a disposable and the photos are on disc so Glenn will add them next time we write.
I started my Spanish lessons tonight and after about 10 minutes into the class the teacher said OK no more English so we just had to speak Spanish for the next 2hours and 50 minutes. It is fun and the teacher is lovely but I still can't do it. Oh well ony 12 more hours to go. Until next time - hooroo