About us
This walking group explores the dynamic past and present of Austin's urban environment. We discover the birds, balconies, and boneyards, forgotten civic skeletons and rewilded lots, and weird-Austin-era yard decorations that stitch together Austin's urban and natural tapestry. These events are intended to be adventures but not guided tours.
Photographers and gardeners, historians and placemakers, sociologists and armchair architecture critics alike should feel welcome, provided we have at least two things in common: a deep curiosity about the city of Austin and decent enough shoes to carry us where curiosity leads.
This monthly group won't be the fastest hiking group in the city, but we'll cover 5-7 miles at a contemplative pace. Afterward, some of us stick around to find a place to rehydrate, eat our way back to calorie-neutral, and talk about it all.
Upcoming events
3
Mueller
Bartholomew District Park, 1843 Greenbrook Parkway, Austin, TX, USNear the close of the millennium, the 700-acre patch of land wedged between Airport Boulevard, 51st Street, I-35, and Manor Road served ten airlines as a municipal airport named after former city councilor Robert Mueller. Unable to meet growing capacity but boxed in from expansion, the city chose to relocate the airport to the site of the recently closed Bergstrom Air Force Base. Partnering with Catellus Development Corporation, the City of Austin thoughtfully reclaimed the old airport space to help accommodate residential expansion.
Our 6.3 mile walk seeks to experience the neighborhood as it was envisioned, tracing its three peripheral greenbelts before visiting its bustling commercial center.
Along the way, we’ll encounter remnants of the old airport, including two airport hangars (one now a 20-acre movie production site, the other a food trailer park) and the iconic Croft Tower- once an air traffic control tower. While the neighborhood’s namesake Mueller Lake is landscaped, the Southeast Greenway maintains a restored blacklands prairie habitat. Southwest Greenway, built in collaboration with the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center, reintroduces native plants. The Northwest Greenway serves as a stormwater management system.
By the end of the walk, we’ll be hungry but surrounded by an abundance of food options…so some of us will stick around.
TRANSIT LOGISTICS:
- 8 AM start, on our Summer schedule
- We’ll meet at the parking lot by Field 1 of the Delwood Sports Complex in Bartholomew District Park. If you have any trouble finding a spot, there should be plenty of street parking just north in Windsor Park on Sunny Brook, Westmoor, Suffolk, and other neighborhood streets.
- Official walk map
16 attendees
North Cat Mountain
Bull Creek District Park, 6711 Lakewood Dr, Austin, TX, USDespite not being annexed into Austin until the end of the 20th century, Bull Creek has been inhabited for over nine thousand years. An abundance of spring water, flint, and pecan grove shelter made this rocky patch of the Edwards Plateau habitable by the Tonkawa, Waco, Apache, and Comanche. In the 19th and 20th centuries, cedar choppers supported construction of railroad ties, foundation piers, fence posts and charcoal. Gangs of bootleggers electrified local cellars with “white lightning”–illegal even before Prohibition–as far back as the Civil War.
Our 6.9 mile walk traverses Bull Creek District Park as well as the residential areas of Mesa Oaks, Vista West, and North Cat Mountain which, though modern, feel carved out of the hilly terrain rather than imposed upon it. We’ll visit specific historic sites along the way: stepping into a forest preserve surrounding the moonshiner’s Stillhouse Cave and passing by the site of a former cedar mill.
At the end of the walk, we’ll consider stopping for lunch at the legendary County Line on the Lake, just under a mile from our starting point. Here we’ll get a view of the mighty Colorado River which otherwise flows just out of sight of our walk.
TRANSIT LOGISTICS:
- 8 AM start, on our Summer schedule
- We’ll meet in the parking lot at Bull Creek District Park at 6701 Lakewood Drive
- Official walk map
Event photo: Larry D. Moore, CC BY 4.0, Wikimedia Commons
7 attendees
Past events
20
