Road Trip

Austin, Texas

By Gene Menez

The people of Austin would like you to do them a favor: Stay away. Read this if you'd like, but don't come to their funky college town. Too many people have already discovered -- and overrun -- what once was a hidden gem.

But if you insist on visiting, the friendly people will still be more than happy to show you a Texas-sized good time. It takes just one stroll down Sixth Street or one lazy afternoon on Lake Travis to learn what locals and University of Texas students and alumni have known all along: Austin is the capital of cool. Nestled between the rolling hills and sparkling lakes of central Texas, the scenery cuts an image more Pacific Northwest than Southwest. This bohemia bursts with creativity. Janis Joplin, Willie Nelson and Stevie Ray Vaughan all got their starts here, and on any given night live music, the lifeblood of Austin, plays at more than 100 venues throughout the city. Every March the entertainment industry jams into town for the annual South by Southwest Festival. The number of movies made in town has increased 10-fold in the past decade, turning it into the leading film production center in the South. And no other city can boast being Forbes.com's best city for singles, as well as the place where UT alum Matthew McConaughey was busted playing the bongos naked.

Fans in Austin aren't just hooked on their football team. Darren Carroll

When clothed, McConaughey can often be found with 80,000 other people -- including the likes of Sandra Bullock -- at Royal-Memorial Stadium, wearing burnt orange and throwing the hook 'em-horns sign that indicates membership in the state's most rabid gang: Longhorns fans. (It's also flashed at Disch-Falk Field, home to a baseball team that has made a record 30 College World Series appearances, and the Erwin Center, where the men's and women's hoops teams, both of which went to the 2003 Final Four, play.) Remember, the thumb doesn't stick out; it's a UT game, not a Mötley Crüe concert.

After football games the many sides of Austin usually converge in the Sixth Street entertainment district. Frat boys and cowboys, queer eyes and straight guys, "Save your soul" freaks and high-tech geeks party side by side. It's enough to make ex-Austinites homesick, as detailed by Texas singer Doug Sahm in his 1974 song about the city, Groover's Paradise. "I want to go back to Texas/Where cosmic cowgirls play/I want to have some fun/In a good ole Texas way/Down in Groover's Paradise."

In the mid 1990s high-tech companies and land developers came to town, and many Austinites believe their paradise has since lost her groove. The population in the metropolitan area has swelled to 1.25 million, and landmarks, such as live-music venues Armadillo, Hole in the Wall and Liberty Lunch, have been squeezed out.

There's one thing, however, keeping Austin cool. The heart of the town is the university's 50,000 students, who give the city what the Fountain never gave Ponce de Leon: eternal youth. Every fall thousands of freshmen arrive. They spend four years studying in Austin and then move on. Then they spend a lifetime trying to get back.

Issue date: October 7, 2003