Houston may have helped to launch a man on the moon, but Austin has launched the careers of some of the world’s biggest music stars, from Willie Nelson to Janis Joplin. The songbook of this city is the playlist of America itself, recording the nation’s triumphs and toils in country ballads, R&B and rock ‘n’ roll — whatever style you can scoot your boots to.
But the Live Music Capital of the World doesn’t just rest its heels on its stages, even if they are some of the biggest platforms in the universe. This eccentric, complicated and wildly popular city excels in so many areas — in food, in art and in its laid-back way of life.
Austin can also be as quaint as it is cultural, with its swimming holes, local jam sessions and paddling on Lady Bird Lake. But around every corner is another weird surprise — the found-object grottos in Sparky Park or literally 1.5 million bats, not-so-secretly living under a bridge.
If you just moved to Austin, get an in-depth look at the beating heart of the Texas Hill Country in Mayflower’s Austin Insider’s Guide.
Where to Get a Culture Fix in Austin
The Live Music Capital of the World is also bursting at the seams in other cultural arenas — visual arts, dance and theatre, history and science. Austin’s many museums run from the folksy to the funky to the first-class, and you will be hard-pressed to find a subject matter that isn’t covered by one of the city’s many institutions.
History buffs will want to visit the LBJ Presidential Library and Museum, where they can research the life and work of the nation’s 36th president, who was born in nearby Johnson City. Inside you’ll find the iconic Great Hall with Johnson’s archives and replicas of the Oval Office and the First Lady’s office. The exhibit dedicated to Ladybird Johnson’s legacy is not to be missed. However, automatonophobes should steer clear of the LBJ animatronic, which is convincingly almost-lifelike, especially when he makes self-deprecating comments. Other notable history-related sites include the George Washington Carver Museum and the Bullock Museum.
Austin isn’t quite the visual arts mecca of Houston, but the Bat City does have a lot to recommend it, even without a designated arts district to concentrate the creative activity. The Blanton Museum of Art at UT-Austin has more than 21,000 objects in its permanent collection and is also home to a monumental work by Ellsworth Kelly (more on that below). Also at the university, the UT Visual Arts Center has several galleries which exhibit work by the newest members of the art world — UT students — as well as faculty and remarkable artists from around the world. The Contemporary Austin has two sites: the Jones Center downtown is something of an architectural icon, with artworks integrated on the building façade; the Contemporary’s sculpture park at Laguna Gloria in West Austin is where you’ll see outdoor works by major artists like Wangechi Mutu, Ai Weiwei and Nicole Eisenman. Also downtown is the Mexic-Arte Museum, one of the few institutions devoted exclusively to exhibiting works by Mexican American artists. Galleries like grayDuck, MASS and Cloud Tree help round out the scene.
At the Long Center, visitors can see live entertainment of all kinds – music, movies, dance and theatre — on the world’s first 3D-printed stage. The 2023-24 season will feature a performance by Renée Fleming, the Guelaguetza Oaxaqueña (a Oaxacan festival) and even humorous events, like “Graham Reynolds Ruins the Holidays.” The Austin Symphony Orchestra and Ballet Austin round out the cultural offerings of the Bat City.
Where to Get Your Game on in Austin
Austin’s reputation as out of the ordinary precedes it, and this claim to fame applies equally well to Austin’s sports scene. This is not a pro football town or a pro basketball town or a pro baseball town — those are left to San Antonio, Dallas and Houston, though minor league games are popular here: the Austin Spurs (a feeder team for San Antonio), the Round Rock Express (an Astros affiliate) and the Texas Stars (the AHL affiliate for Dallas).
Austin certainly has a strong fan base for other pro sports, though, and soccer has one of the biggest followings. The Austin FC, who play at the Gensler-designed Q2 Stadium, draws huge crowds to every game, especially when they’re taking on the Houston Dynamo or FC Dallas.
In case you forget you’re in cowboy country, Rodeo still has a huge contingency in the Bat City. No surprise, really — rodeo is the official sport of the Lone Star State. The city’s pro bull-riding team is the Austin Gamblers, and let’s just say that you wouldn’t want to end up on the wrong side of the steer with this team. Each spring the city hosts Rodeo Austin, a weeks-long, blowout event with a carnival, concerts and agricultural shows. Although the pro riders put on an amazing show, some of the rodeo’s lowest-stakes events are the most fun to watch. Like, the Swifty Swine Pig Races, held at Pork Chop Downs, where a group of hasty-hoofed hogs compete for a single, coveted Oreo cookie. There are also stunt shows, turkey races and Frisbee dogs, who will put your disc game to shame.
Speaking of which, Austin has its own American Ultimate Disc League team — the Austin Sol — and this still lesser-known sport is rapidly growing in popularity. The AUDL, which was only founded 11 years ago, now has 24 teams between the U.S. and Canada, and the Sol is ranked second in the South division.
Austin also has pro rugby teams — the Austin Blacks and the Austin Valkyries, for those who really want to get down in the mud with their opponents. If you prefer even more chaos, check out Austin’s gender-inclusive Roller Derby team — the Austin Anarchy — which truly lives up to its name.
One team almost everyone in the state can get behind is the Horns. The University of Texas’s Longhorns have brought home 64 championship titles in baseball, basketball, cross country, football, golf, rowing, tennis, swimming and diving and track and field. Don’t be alarmed by chants of Hook ‘em! They’re not directed at you.
Things You Can Only See and Experience in Austin
Each spring, Zilker Park — one of the city’s top destinations for outdoor fun — hosts its popular ABC Kite Fest, which marked its 95th year in 2023. Contests for the biggest kite, the best kite pilot and the most unusual kite establish recreational bragging rights for the year. Because this is Austin, there’s also live music during the event — the kid-friendly MossFest. The park also hosts other free concerts each year, like Austin City Limits Radio’s Blues on the Green.
Austin’s biggest acts of live music are so well-known they truly need no introduction. Austin City Limits and SXSW have solidified Austin’s reputation as the Live Music Capital of the World. But Austin stirs up a mighty crowd for smaller shows, too. Each year, the Urban Cultural Fest showcases the best in R&B, hip-hop, jazz, soul and more. At Utopiafest, held an hour outside Austin at the Four Sisters Ranch, families can camp out for an ideal weekend of rural fun. There’s also The Big Squeeze, a long-running accordion competition — now in its 46th year! — held at the Bullock Museum. Local squeeze boxers compete in conjunto, polka and zydeco/Cajun categories for the best in bellows.
Thanks to the music scene, Austin still has numerous purveyors of vinyl, CDs and the occasional cassette tape, whether you’re looking for rare Jazz LPs, bootleg Bob Dylan concerts or the latest surprise drop from Taylor Swift. End of an Ear, BLK Vinyl and Waterloo Records are three of our faves.
Color theorists and minimalist art geeks will want to make a pilgrimage to the Blanton Museum at UT-Austin, where you can see Ellsworth Kelly’s Austin, a joyous, chapel-like space with colorful glass windows that turns this meditative space into a site of wonder. In recognition of this visionary creation, the mayor of Austin designated May 31, 2023, Ellsworth Kelly Day.
If you have kiddos, you will thank yourself for taking them to the Thinkery, Austin’s children’s museum. This 40,000 square-feet amazeum will hook your kids on high-STEAM action, from building with illuminated blocks to making their own launch glider in the Spark Shop. Fair warning: everything is hands-on and can get pretty messy in the Thinkery, just like in your own mind. Pack a change of clothes (for everyone) when you have finally pried your progeny from the paint-the-walls activity.
DYK, Austin is, like, totally for shopping? Tis true. Austin is still a city of great brick-and-mortars and e-tailers, so give your online orderingt a vacation and patronize a local shop for your latest home dec needs or that looong overdue baby gift for your bestie. Where you ought to have shopped for that quirky-cute onesie 24 months ago is Parts & Labor, a gift shop of locally made wares that’s been around since the early aughts. Luckily, they have everything in 2T, from the armadillo appliqué to the Mr. T tee, and they also carry jewelry, tea towels and art prints — for that no-longer-new-to-momhood BFF. Other great Austin-only shops include The Little Gay Shop, Bookwoman (a feminist bookstore) and the pop-ups of the Black Makers Market.
Lovers of dad jokes, groaners and verbal corniness will not want to miss Austin’s 46th-annual Pun-Off World Championships. During this Fozzie Bear-approved competition, word nerds vie for glory in a tongue-twisting match of verbal warfare. Whoever throws the biggest punchline wins. If punning isn’t remotely your speed, try the MotoGP Red Bull Grand Prix at Austin’s Circuit of the Americas, which will recalibrate your systems and get all your engines firing. Wocka wocka!
Where to Get Outdoors in Austin
In a city loaded with cultural attractions, it can be easy to spend your time indoors bouncing between concerts, museums and restaurants. But residents know that some of the best parts of Austin are outside. You’re bound to spend some of your time at the city’s well-known favorites, like Lady Bird Lake — a paddler’s paradise — and Zilker Metropolitan Park, where you can play disc golf, swim in the famous Barton Springs Pool and stroll around the botanical gardens. But there are plenty of gems hidden away, where you feel you’ve got a corner of the city all to yourself.
One of the best ways to get to know your new home is on a bike tour of Austin. The Bat City is known for its bike-friendliness, and there are several outfitters who will hook you up with a set of two wheels and help you get to know this historic town. There are themed tours, where you can focus on the city’s architectural icons, and others that introduce one of the city’s most important features — its breweries! If you prefer to explore on your own, the Barton Creek Greenbelt is an easy place to start, providing roughly eight miles of trails throughout South Austin with multiple access points. You can easily hop off the trail to go hiking, swimming or even rock climbing.
Pease Park is a beloved in-town green space along the Shoal Creek that has shady trails, wildflower meadows, public art, a cool playscape and a splash pad for those crazy-hot summer days. One of the park’s best features is the iconic Treehouse, a two-story sculptural perch with a hammock-like level that gives visitors a bird’s-eye view.
Ornithological enthusiasts, be warned — you’ll have a big bingo card to fill out in this Texas town. The state already has one of the country’s most diverse bird populations, and some estimate that there are over 400 species of birds living in Austin. The ruby-crowned kinglet might be the star of your feeder with its shock of red hair, or it could be the impeccably dressed cedar waxwing or the golden-fronted woodpecker, which has a tri-color cap. Most exciting — at least for Stevie Nicks fans — will be Austin’s population of white-winged doves, who sing a song that’s, um, hauntingly familiar. Beside your own backyard, some of the best places to go birding in Austin include Hornsby Bend (which is — hold your nose — also a sewage treatment facility) and the Travis Audubon, which hosts bird walks at various spots, including Chaetura Canyon.
The adventuresome set will want to set their sights on the trails and treks through the Hill Country. Hikers will find the area endlessly explorable, and climbers can get their fix in and out of the city.
The Barton Creek Greenbelt has several good spots for climbing. Gus Fruh is one of the hotspots, and when it gets too hot, you can just plunge into the creek below. Incidentally, Austinites have former U.T. civil engineering professor Fruh to thank for the swimmability of those cooling waters — he is the one urged the city to ensure that the creek met the highest water quality standards, despite increasing urbanization. Serious rock climbers love Reimer’s Ranch — it’s less than an hour from the city and offers courses for beginners to those with advanced skills.
Southwest of the city, you can make your acquaintance with the ancient, 103-foot-tall cypress tree known fondly as Old Baldy, who resides at McKinney Falls State Park. While hiking the nine miles of trails around this picturesque site, you’ll be treated to views of limestone waterfalls, colorful wildflowers and the often heard but rarely seen painted buntings.
Oh, and don’t miss ziplining at Lake Travis. Just 20 miles northwest of the city, this refreshing oasis — actually an enormous reservoir in the Colorado River — is a staycationer’s paradise, surrounded by water parks, smaller swimming holes and fun places to stay, shop and eat. It’s the favorite freshwater destination in the Lone Star State.
Local Eats in Austin
The food in Austin has gotten so good over the last ten years, you will be hard-pressed to keep your dining to three meals a day. It’s better to just adopt a snack-all-day attitude so that you can perpetually graze from all the city’s fine tables and food trucks. Austin’s greatest staples — barbeque, Tex-Mex, breakfast tacos and kolaches — are merely the start of a long list of epicurean delights, so you can start with the well-known favorites and then dig in deep.
One of the most famous spots in the city is the divey Texas Chili Parlor — an establishment which has been immortalized in both film and song for its Mad Dog Margaritas and other claims to fame. If you’re new to Texas, a word of caution — you’ll have your cowboy credentials taken offa ya if you ask why there aren’t beans in your chili. That stew is bean-free in the Lone Star State.
When you want a Texas breakfast all day, head to the classic — Joe’s Bakery. This is the food you need to recover from honky-tonkying too hard the night before or to prepare for a day’s hard labor. You’ll find few low-cal, “heart-healthy” options on this indulgent Tex-Mexfast menu, where even the oatmeal comes with an optional side of tortillas, but it’s your soul this food will satisfy when you’re snarfing down the chicharrones, pork chops & eggs or that hearty migas plate.
Looking for other Southern specialties? Sawyer & Co., an upscale, New Orleans-style diner, will satisfy your craving for eggs over the Big Easy. Creole shrimp & grits, NOLA French toast and blacken catfish po’ boys are just the beginning of a great menu and an even better morning for you.
Barbeque in Austin is a serious industry, one that can make you friends for life or enemies forever more. But when your mouth is full of ribs and smoked sausage, it’s hard to argue over whose is the best (or at least impolite) — better to agree that Austin’s BBQ scene is the best in the state and leave it at that.
In the constellation of Austin’s excellent barbeque establishments, Interstellar BBQ has truly set itself apart, literally and figuratively. It’s located far north of the city, and it serves items you won’t find at the nearer stars in the Bat City BBQ galaxy — beef kielbasa, turkey brined in hefeweizen and smoked scalloped potatoes.
In the East Cesar Chavez area, wife and wife team LeAnn Mueller & Alison Clem have elevated the art of smoked sandwichery at la Barbeque, with items like la Frito Loco — pulled pork and brisket topped with chipotle slaw, black beans, jalapenos, cheese and (of course) Fritos — or the Sloppy Ho, chopped brisket topped with house chili. They also run the cheeky Red Rocket Weiner Wagon, home of the 9-inch umami dogs.
Embracing his childhood nickname from El Paso, where he was known as “El JewBoy,” proprietor Mo Pittle opened up JewBoy Burgers, as deliciously beefy, culinary mash-up. You’ll find the best of many worlds in these hot sandwiches, from the Sloppy Jose to the Oy Vey Guey, a burger smothered in roasted hatch green chiles and pepper jack. Don’t disappoint your safta and forget to order Bubbe’s latkes with queso.
One of the best ways to get acquainted with Austin’s diverse culinary stars is at one of the city’s food truck parks or food courts. The South Austin Thicket Food Park has a dozen food trailers with foods from all over the world to tempt you, including Revolution Vegan Kitchen, Reem’s (Jerusalem street food), Plantain Bar (Puerto Rican fusion) and Song La (Taiwanese). The Thicket also has a stage for events, a community garden and offers outdoor yoga classes — a perfect prelude to a decadent sandwich from the Brooklyn Breakfast Shop.
Austin has plenty of stand-out standalones, too. Old Thousand serves updated Asian classics, sometimes with unexpectedly Austinian additions, like the brisket fried rice, Hong Kong French Toast with banana custard filling, or the pecan bubble waffles, which you can upgrade to a chicken-and-waffle fest by adding black pepper karaage. Every dish sparkles with creativity.
In Central Austin, FoodHeads is the most delightful spot for lunch in the city. The chicken and eggplant sandwich is earthly and deep and the squash sandwich is heavenly vegetarian, but the real treat is the fish torta, where the pan-fried tilapia is adorned with piquant apple pico, lime slaw, creamy avocado and bright chimichurri. In other words, this is no ordinary fish sandwich.
If you have something extra special to celebrate, Olamaie is the place to mark the occasion. Located in a well-appointed converted house, the atmosphere at Olamaie is homey and refined. Every dish is thoughtfully prepared and plated to celebrate local flavors, from the Smoked Beef Belly to the Blackened Dayboat Fish. Pure, edible elegance.
Locally Loved Austin Coffee Shops
Austin’s caffeination quotient is higher than other cities in the region, perhaps owing to its buzzy nightlife scene, or maybe its citizenry just has an enlightened appreciation of a great roast and being fully fueled. Whatever the reason for Austin’s strong coffee game, we’re happy to drink it in.
We admire Barrett’s Coffee for many things. One is that you can actually buy an 8-oz drip coffee here —12 ounces has always been too much for a standard cup of joe and not enough when you really need to be defibrillated via java. But Barrett’s really stands out for its house specials. The Chocolate Orange Blossom Latte is cause for immediate celebration, and their Nitro Root Beer Float is the soda shop special your inner child always wanted to grow up and drink.
When you really want to spoil yourself or someone special, go to Sa-Tén. This Japanese café and eatery has one of the city’s most rewarding menus. Their specialty drinks — the non-caffeinated mugicha, yuzu lemonade and bananas foster cold brew — are really just the beginning. We especially appreciate the Japanese take on the traditional Cowboy breakfast, swapping chicken katsu and arabiki sausage for American standards. It’s also hard to pick a favorite from their selection of milk bread toasts, but the sriracha smoked salmon is worth swimming upstream for. Don’t pass up a slice of the Japanese Cheesecake Bread, either. Ever. Get two and make a new best friend.
Civil Goat sets itself apart from the crowd with its high standard for roasting, brewing and dining but also with its actual resident goat, Butters, who just might be the GGOAT — greatest goat of all time. We are suckers for their Guatemala Los Encinos beans, and their canned cold brews are perfect for picnics. Much like Butters, their food menu is also frisky, with organic acai bowls, hearty salads and sammies and the cinnamon toast of your dreams.
Brewsnoots — you know who you are — should make a beeline for Trianon Coffee — located on Bee Cave Road — where the beans hail from organic, single-origin microlots and the impeccable roasting will transport you straight to the Elysian source. Their basic small batch starts at $16/lb., but premium roasts can set you back a staggering $65/lb. Café offerings are impeccably prepared, from the breve to the iced London Fog. Another perk: Trianon serves Rosen’s Bagels. Don’t pass them up.
If you’re looking for a bigger buzz, The Brew and Brew can hook you up from dawn till way past dusk with perky roasts, smooth draughts and the craftiest of cocktails.
If you get turned around, Figure 8 Coffee Purveyors will set you straight. This cheeky, irreverent and friendly spot tucked away on Austin’s East Side, offers specialty roasts from Ethiopia, Brazil, El Salvador and more.
Austin Happy Hour Haunts and Nightlife
No one knows how to kick back and relax quite like Austinites do. As the Live Music Capital of the World, you’ll never have to roam far to find great tunes, whether it’s from a global legend or a local up-and-comer. Who knows, maybe you’re the next big thing…if you dare to step up to one of the city’s many open mics.
Austin City Limits broadcasts live from the Moody Theatre, and each year there are bound to be at least a couple shows you really can’t stand to miss. The 2023 season welcomes headliners like Lyle Lovett and His Large Band, Trombone Shorty & Orleans Avenue and Liz Phair.
The Red River Cultural District is jumping with music joints and restaurants, like Stubb’s Bar-B-Q, which also has a killer Gospel Brunch on Sundays. Show of hands for the smokey brisket, garlic cheese grits and a little hair of the dog? Antone’s (on 5th Street) is still the home of the Blues, and the Mohawk showcases all genres, from psychedelic punk to post-grunge rock to Weird Al Appreciation Night. Costumes are encouraged.
Austin’s comedic answer to the day’s dreadful news is Esther’s Follies, a vaudevillian performance troupe that’s been dishing up political satire — and sometimes just dishing — for the after-dinner crowd for 40 years.
Esther’s is one of the anchors of the historic 6th Street district, which is basically a 365-day-long, city-wide street party, where you’ll find crowded, open-air establishments, cozy clubs and speakeasies…if you know which alleyways and stairwells to peer into. Midnight Cowboy converted an illicit “massage parlor” into a swanky and seductive house of mixology, complete with a secret entrance. The Milonga Room is an Argentine escape beneath the Buenos Aires Café — think cerulean walls, tufted demilune booths in burnt orange velvet and luxuriant elixirs blending floral, herbal and seductively earthly elements.
Transplants from the Pacific Northwest may be understandably skeptical of Austin’s wineries but try to suspend judgment — the region’s unique climate and nutrient-rich soil make for some very worthy viticultural operations in and around the city. Tempranillo, Albariño and Malbec are just some of the grapes that do well here. Fall Creek Vineyards — the oldest vintner in the Hill Country — has been bottling its 100% Texas-grown varietals since 1975. Torr Na Lochs prides itself on sustainable practices, from using only organic fertilizer to watering with collected rainwater and condensate from air conditioning systems. We’ll toast to that.
One of the more unusual fermentaries is Meridian Hive, a mead-making establishment that turns pure orange blossom honey into drinkable adult confections infused with fruit flavors and spices.
If wine seems like an exotic import in this capital city, Tiki-Tatsuya will feel downright paradisical. Tropical throwbacks like the Painkiller, Pearl Diver and Skeleton Cruise will transport you to a faraway isle, one passion-fruity sip at a time.
Honestly, though? There’s no place more relaxing than an honest-to-goodness honky-tonk. After a week of Zooms, Slacks and IRL nonsense, the easiest way to forget your troubles is on the dance floor in your favorite boots with 100 of your new BFFs. Drown your sorrows in a spicy Michelada at the Little Longhorn or grab your buddies for some beers and shuffle boarding at Giddy Ups.
One place that’ll never let you down is Cheer Up Charlies, and it’s also one of the best spots to get a little nightlife in the noontime hour. This LGBTQ+ dance club has made The Austin Chronicle’s Best-Of list for years, and they host an outrageously good drag brunch.
Hidden Gems in Austin
Fans of the macabre will find they are in good company in Austin, where numerous outfits offer ghost tours of the capital city. You’ll find ghostly bus tours, haunted pub crawls, corporate ghost tours (great for workplace bonding!) and even Segway ghost tours, for those who think spirits can be outwitted and outrun by early 21st-century vehicular technology. Those whose interest in the gruesome and ghastly does not abide the spirit realm may prefer the grim “murder walks” of the city, which tracks the trail of horror of Austin’s “midnight assassin,” a serial axe murderer who terrorized the city in 1885.
For a lighter and brighter experience — maybe even one involving an actual Lite-Brite — visit the Texas Toy Museum, where you can play all your old favorites — Speak & Spell, Connect Four, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles — and show off your finishing moves in the original Mortal Kombat arcade game.
Novelty freaks will also enjoy the Museum of the Weird, where it’s normal to believe in UFOs, Yetis and Nessie. This is a place to inhabit a world Vincent Price would approve of. You also won’t want to miss the Museum of Natural & Artificial Ephemerata, where all the collections are impermanent. Even the venue is subject to change, based on the residency of its proprietors, who began the museum in Tucson and relocated it to their Austin abode at the turn of the century.
Another palace of the home-spun is Austin’s Cathedral of Junk, located on the property of famed/begrudged yardist Vince Hannemann, who has repurposed the Bat City’s discards as unexpected building blocks, to the delight of many and the chagrin of some near neighbors.
Rice University has one of the city’s more unusual venues —the Twilight Epiphany Skyspace. This outdoor musical performance space designed by light-based sculptor James Turrell is a transcendent wonder. Twice daily, visitors are treated to a 40-minute LED light sequence — early birds can catch the display in the pre-dawn hour, and night owls can catch the sunset show.
When you’re living in Bat City, the Congress Avenue Bridge bat colony is no secret. (How do you hide 1.5 million bats?) But while most onlookers crowd onto the bridge in the evening to watch them take flight each dusk, the bold and the brave are in the water beneath the bridge on a bat-watching kayak tour. Should you embark on this water-bound, nocturnal journey, we advise several things.
- Wear a life jacket: one million of anything taking off over your head is startling — even butterflies en masse might cause you to freak out, flail around and capsize. Not that that happened to us.
- When the bats take off, gasp if you must, but keep your mouth covered — bats are small, love warm, dark, cozy spots and do not taste good.
- Don’t be a mosquito. These bats have taken flight to look for their dinner, and the Mexican free-tailed menu features mosquitos, midges, moths — whatever’s in season. Don’t be in season.
If you’re looking to explore other cities in the Lone Star State, check out our Texas moving guide.
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