This week we decided to take a run to San Felipe De Austin , the town that Stephen F. Austin founded when he began to establish a colony in Texas. It's about 150 miles from our house so we thought it would make an easy daytrip. In a couple of hours we had reached the site, which was well-kept and easy to find. The only down side was that there wasn't a lot to see. The town had been burned by the Texas army when they retreated to points east during the war. Apparently some archaeological digs have taken place, but unlike the Alamo, the town has not yet been rebuilt. So we got our passport stamped, toured the museum and were treated to a well-informed tutorial from the two folks working there. By lunchtime we had seen the entire site and were on the lookout for a place to chow down.
The folks at the museum suggested a good place to eat in Sealy, the closest town to San Felipe. We had lunch there at Annie's Deli and Garden Cafe which turned out to be a little gem, although it would have been hard to spot if the ladies at the museum hadn't given us great directions.
By about 12:30 we were finished with lunch and, as there didn't seem to be a lot shopping or anything else of interest to us in Sealy, we debated about whether to head home or go somewhere else. I guess I should have mentioned that our anniversary was this week so we were in one of those prom weekend modes that Ellie likes so much. So, even though we had been celebrating our anniversary for nearly a week, we were not in the mood to end it and head home. Ellie pointed out that we only had one more stamp to get: the one for the San Jacinto Monument in La Porte, 73 miles away on the other side of Houston. We had planned to hit San Jacinto later in the year in conjunction with a long weekend in Galveston, but since we were so close we decided to run over there and pick up that last stamp.
We had to drive straight across Houston to get to La Porte but it was early afternoon and the traffic wasn't too bad. Our GPS was in a cantankerous mood so we ended up taking the wrong freeway at one point, which probably added twenty miles or so to our trip, but we reached the San Jacinto monument at a reasonable hour and had plenty of time to visit the museum, which is in the base of the monument. The monument itself is a 570-foot tall stone column. That's 15 feet taller than the Washington Monument, which is supposed to be the tallest obelisk in the world. I'm not sure why the Washington Monument is called an obelisk and the San Jacinto Monument is called a memorial column, but ours is bigger and that's the truth. Like the Washington Monument the San Jacinto Monument has an elevator inside and observation areas at the top. Ellie and I decided not to ride it because she doesn't like heights and the monument is near the Houston ship channel and tank farm area so we thought the view might not be all that spectacular. The battleship Texas is also moored at the San Jacinto site but neither Ellie nor I are into WWII ships, so we didn't tour it. We just collected our stamp, checked out the museum and headed home. Our daytrip ended up being a 423-mile journey. It was a long ride but we enjoyed both the San Felipe De Austin and San Jacinto museums.
We've driven between 1350 and 1400 miles this year to visit the major sites on the Texas Independence Trail. That's a lot of time to spend in the car but we have had the opportunity to meet a lot people who are passionate about the history and heritage of Texas and we've learned a good bit about the events that culminated in the formation of this great state where we have made our home for over thirty years.
We're going to send in the fully stamped passport this week. Can't wait to see what the commemorative gift is. After all that driving I hope it's a gas card.
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