Spend a 3-Day Weekend in Revitalized Brownwood
July 29, 2021 | By Paul Brown
Getaways
Beyond Oktoberfest: Meet Fredericksburg’s Lesser-Known Traditions
May 7, 2021 | By Sallie Lewis
This month, the city of Fredericksburg kicks off its 175th anniversary with a yearlong celebration culminating next May.
My Favorite Texas Trip: Two Couples Blaze Through Big Bend Country
March 31, 2020 | By John Lumpkin
In the fall of 2018, my wife, Eileen, and I invited two friends to the outer reaches of West Texas for our annual couples’ trip. Our pals, Terry and Anne Marie, live in Philadelphia—I came to know Terry when we were roommates at the University of Virginia in the 1960s. While Terry spent some of his high school years in Houston, it had been many years since he’d returned to Texas. While Eileen and I had been to Big Bend twice before (and to other parts of West Texas too many times to count), Terry and Anne Marie had never been.
Kendall County Proves Parts of the Hill Country Are Still Wild
March 26, 2020 | By Joe Nick Patosk
Winter Getaway: New Energy and Classic Cowtown Converge in Fort Worth
November 27, 2019 | By June Naylor
Fall Weekend Getaway: Post Oak Savannah
October 29, 2019 | By Dan Oko
The southern span of the Post Oak Savannah in East Texas evolved out of ancient woodlands of oak and hickory that once stretched from Canada to Central America.
Fall Getaway: Follow the Butterfly Trail in the Valley
September 30, 2019 | By Daniel Blue Tyx
The Texas Butterfly Festival promises visitors “the best butterflying in America.” It might seem like hyperbole were the claim not backed up by the fact that the Rio Grande Valley contains a greater diversity of butterflies than anywhere else in the country—more than 300 species and counting, or roughly 40 percent of the butterflies in North America. You can see a great deal of them at the festival, which takes place the first week of November at the National Butterfly Center in Mission. All of those butterflies—condensed within a region that’s easy to traverse over a weekend—make a fall tour of the Valley a must-do on any Texas bucket list
Getaway: A Weekend in Lubbock
August 29, 2019 | By Clayton Maxwell
Lubbock may not be the first city that comes to mind when considering the arts in Texas, but maybe it should be. The High Plains town that nurtured many of Texas’ most exalted musicians—Buddy Holly, Waylon Jennings, Joe Ely, Terry Allen, and Jimmie Dale Gilmore to name a few—must have some creative fairy dust blowing through its Caprock winds. The visual arts are now finding fertile soil here, too. Just walk through the galleries and workshops of the Lubbock Cultural District, and you’ll get a whiff of the artistic freedom inspired by the city’s wide-open spaces and 265 days of sunshine a year—a freedom that also comes from a cost-of-living low enough that artists don’t sweat the rent. Like the wildly spinning wind turbines you pass on the drive into town, the “Hub City” is generating energy worthy of attention. If you are one of those travelers who buzzes through Lubbock on your way to New Mexico or Colorado, consider staying for the weekend to see what you’re missing.
Summer Getaway: A Weekend in Wichita Falls
July 31, 2019 | By Alex Temblador
Growing up in Wichita Falls, I noticed my hometown didn’t attract many visitors. Downtown was full of empty aging buildings. Restaurants opened and closed every other year, and stores in the mall changed constantly—none offering the fashionable choices found in bigger cities like Dallas. Locals were content with driving more than two hours to Dallas for entertainment or one hour north to Oklahoma to
Summer Getaway: A Weekend in Seguin
June 24, 2019 | By Michael Corcoran
Seguin’s mix of Hispanic and Czech/German culture can be heard in the Mexican polka “Viva Seguin,” made famous in the early ’40s by Santiago Jiménez Sr. It’s an instrumental about a lyrical town, with a beat everyone can dance to.
Aransas Pass Makes a Perfect Summer Weekend Getaway
June 4, 2019 | By John Lumpkin
Could there be a better way to experience a town comprised of at least 70 percent saltwater than to get to the water as fast as you can? With 41 square miles of Redfish Bay inside its city limits, Aransas Pass offers just that—
a self-described “Saltwater Heaven” building on its revival after Hurricane Harvey’s destruction in 2017.
Book it to the Big Country for The Children’s Art and Literacy Festival in Abilene
April 30, 2019 | By Matt Joyce
My children stepped foot in Abilene for the first time in their short lives last June for a quick three-night visit. Now, even though it’s been a year, mention Abilene to them and you’ll get a happy earful of stories.
This fond association traces directly to the Children’s Art & Literacy Festival, an annual celebration of all things picture books. Most people know Abilene as the capital of the Big Country, a dusty railroad outpost thick with steakhouses and Churches of Christ. But for three days every June, the festival (known as CALF) cloaks downtown Abilene in an imaginative world of colorful characters and fanciful tales—and ice cream vendors aplenty.
A Palo Duro Canyon Community Offers More Than Meets the Eye
March 28, 2019 | By Jason Boyett
Your first time in Canyon, you’ll be forgiven for wondering where this Panhandle community of about 15,000 gets its name. Heading into town, you pass beehives from a local honey farm, the sprawling campus of West Texas A&M University, and tidy brick houses. What you won’t see is anything resembling a canyon.
