Enchanted Rock
My big adventure this weekend takes me and some buddies to Enchanted Rock (right past Austin) to do some hiking but it ended up being more rock climbing then hiking. I hadn’t ever really being hiking before, maybe a few times in Panama when I was wandering around the ranch but I didn’t do much rock climbing since I didn’t have a clue where I was or how to get help if I wandered off by myself. I had a blast but I was really surprised how windy it was when we made it to the top of Enchanted Rock.
I was curious about how this huge rock got its name so I looked it up on Wikipedia. Wiki says that there is evidence that humans have been wandering around the Enchanted Rock as far back as 11,000 years. That number is surreal to me, I can’t even imagine that far back; I wonder how much that area has changed since then?
If you take away the concrete parking lots the whole area looked like those old westerns I used to watch as a kid. I kept expecting a good old-fashioned cowboy and Indian shot-off behind the boulders. It looked like the perfect place to send some smoke signals. The whole experience was amazing, being able to get away from the city and almost step back in town.
Wikipedia goes on to describe some of the folklore of local Native American tribes describing magical and spiritual powers to the rock (hence the name ‘Enchanted Rock’). While attempting to hide from Anglo settlers in the area, the Natives would hide on the top two tiers of the rock and, since they were unable to be seen from the ground below, they believed the rock made them invisible. The first European to visit the area was probably Ãlvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca in 1536. The Tonkawa, who inhabited the area in the 16th century, believed that ghost fires flickered at the top of the dome. In particular they heard unexplained creaking and groaning, which geologists attribute to the rock’s night-time contraction after being heated by the sun during the day. The name “Enchanted Rock” derives from Spanish and Anglo-Texan interpretations of such legends and related folklore. (quoted from Wikipedia.com)
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- This is where the hike starts
HURRICANE IKE: Day 2 | Ike has arrived
I woke up this morning completely refreshed… I don’t think i have ever been more happy to sleep on an air mattress in my entire life.  I had slept so well I almost forgot why I was in Austin in the first place then when i turned on the tv it all came rushing back to me.
I feel bad for the people that decided to stay home and ride the storm out because that was exactly what I was gonna do because I just got tired of leaving every weekend. Oh well… I guess I am officially an Ike refugee and at least I get to stay at a kick ass. La casa de Hernandez is in the Domain which is no other way to say but an awesome place for young professionals to live.
The Domain view
Here is a zoomed in view…
The Domain from the street
Oh man for dinner I got to go to CPK… Last time I was in Austin I mentioned that I really liked the pizza at California Pizza Kitchen but the one in Houston is a major trek. So we went and I had the Santa Fe pizza, that pizza was awesome but I have yet to be disappoint with a pizza selection there.
After we ate all the pizza we could we started walking around The Domain just window shopping to see what new stuff the shops were selling. I don’t think I told you that the bottom layer is shops and resaruants with the second and the other floors being the apartments. We walked past this wine bar called Crú. I have to let you know that I am by far anykind of vino conisouer but I do know what I like. I’m not a huge red wine kind of guy unless I am eating pasta (which I already ate earlier so I couldn’t eat anymore) I wanted to try a new white wine.  The weather wasn’t too hot so we decided to sit outside and enjoy the band that was plaing out in the courtyard. When it was time to order I had no clue what I wanted to try since there were too many options. So I used a trick that I learned from a lady whose name is J-lo [true story] when i went to my buddy Dennis’s birthday party at a wine bar in Houston. Jennifer used to be a wine rep so she was making recommendations for everybody on what they should try and everyone loved her recommendations. I was amazed by this so I asked her what her secret was. Basically she knows what regions of the world produced the best tasting grapes for a specific type of wine. I knew that Italy makes good wine so I tried two flights of wine from the predetermined categories that Crú groups together for you. I found out that I really like the Gewürztraminer (guh-VURTS-trah-MEE-ner) which this particular bottle came from New Zealand but hey whatever.
HURRICANE IKE: Day 1 | Get out of town
When i finally arrived in Austin I went straight to the 2008 AWS start-up tour being hosted in the brand new Austin Music Hall in downtown. This was mainly a technical show-and-tell for web start ups. While the material was very technical I was able to grasp what Amazon was offering to provide to internet companies. There were some interesting start-ups that were showcased here, for example other inbox which is another internet inbox for your email but with a new twist that is supposed to help unclutter your other inboxes like gmail or yahoo mail. I signed up for the beta to test it out so we’ll see if it really as cool as they make it sound. Splunk> was another internet startup that utilized Amazon’s services that mainly helps IT professionals analyze their data but I was most impressed with the speakers powerpoint presentation, I wish I had a copy to show because I haven’t seen a presentation put together like that before. The last company to present was my buddy Ray’s company My Baby Our Baby. His site allows parents to create online scrapbooks and photo albums that not only allows parents to archieve and organize memories to keep friends and family members current on juniors activities, but it also a way for friends and family members to upload thier own pictures of junior on the site to a more through memory book.
After the conference we met up with Doan to grab some dinner then we headed over to Blockbuster to rent Baby Momma and the new Madden 09 game. I’m so exhausted I’m gonna just crash tonight.
Bend over Houston Ike is coming…
Alright so I woke up this morning with a phone call from my buddy Kurt telling me to check the news because Houston just issued a mandatory evacuation for Galveston and several zip codes of southeast Houston which of course my zip code was included in the mandatory evac. I’m trying to hurricane proof my apartment as fast as possible and pack enough clothes to last the duration of my exile from home.
I will give some more updates when I finally get to Austin.
Coming to a city near you…
(MJ) out