the digital bird: Texas Hill country

My mom has been in town all week and the other day she had a wild hair to drive out to Fredericksburg. I love a good road trip, so I indulged her. The Texas Hill Country is filled with all sorts of adorable little towns all with major German influence with super cute Main Streets that now house antique shops, silly souvenir stores and quaint little restaurants. The Hill Country has also become a contender in the wine scene, so you can make a day out of it and hit the wineries for wine tasting. We left after lunch, and didn't really have an agenda, as we have both been several times, so we kind of forgot that the town shuts down at around 5:30PM.
We rolled into town at around 4:30PM, so we didn't have much time to do any serious shopping, but I gotta say it was pretty nice to have the sleepy streets to ourselves. We made a pit stop into RED, which is a really nice shop and great for designers looking for a more modern rustic junky vibe and then we wandered into the Fredericksburg Brewing Company for a snack and some vino. That's really about it. We had to walk off that insane bread pudding, so we made lap, feasting our eyes in all of the shops. If you want to make the most of the day, I would leave bright and early, wear comfy shoes and have a little patience. It's a very popular weekend 'day tripper' destination filled with everyone from families to biker enthusiasts.
Fredericksburg is roughly 78 miles / 1.5 hours due West from Austin.