Two weekends ago Groovy Girl and I enjoyed the music, food, and weather of Austin, TX. We had an amazing time together and are the perfect traveling companions. Japhy approached me last spring when the lineup was announced saying “wouldn’t this be fun!” And after looking into it more I took her up on the idea. We looked into tickets and found out you can split the payments up, we found a small Airbnb and the ball started to roll. A few weeks ago our wristbands arrived and it was a reality.
We did have some travel glitches but it all worked out in the end even waiting until Saturday morning to get our luggage. I highly recommend flying Delta out of Minneapolis.
We got in Friday afternoon after our initial delay and picked up our car via my Turo app directions. Have you tried this car borrowing system? I liked it for the most part. Once we had our 2022 Prius we headed for food and our AirBB before venturing off to Zilker Park. Our first restaurant choice was not our best pick but it had a patio and the food was edible. Our AirBB was as pictured, small but tidy and enough for what we needed.
Unfortunetly because our original flight was still in Minneapolis our luggage did not arrive with us so we had to journey to the festival with our travel clothes still on. Luckily we had on cool clothes because Austin weather was warm. A friend had pre-warned us that the walk would be long to get to the park and she was absolutely spot on. And then when we got inside the larger-than-life park there was a lot to traverse to get to different stages, food, etc. Our band line up was amazing:
Friday:
The Moss at 5:15 which was pretty amazing to get there after traveling, eating, and checking in
Maggie Rogers right after and she was amazing-she owned that stage!
The Lumineers-also amazing to hear in person and a great way to end our first night
At the end of our night we found a Target so we could get toothbrushes and other essentials for the night. We knew we would be able to pick up our luggage back at the airport in the morning. We found an amazing Korean food truck across the street and had a fried tofu dish for a late night dinner.
Saturday:
We stopped at a VeraCruz, a taco shop that was highly rated and thus very busy but we wanted to eat before entering the gates.
Mt. Joy-Lovely band that I'd never heard of but loved.
Tanya Tucker- to be honest we saw her so we would be in place for Noah Kahan (Japhy's favorite) and we ended up loving her sass and style.
Noah Kahan-He was definetely a headliner for Japhy and as a treat Mumford and Sons came out and played a song with him.
And then we listened to a bit of the Foo Fighters from afar (the crowd was huge) and headed home.
Sunday:
We found an amazing brunch spot, Another Broken Egg, and had fun sitting at the bar with my now 21-year-old daughter! She had a spiked cold brew comb and I had a Breakfast Blueberry Margarita and then we ordered delicious breakfast items including Smoked Salmon Benedict, cinnamon roll french toast, and a half order of beignets!
Corook- We were at the park much earlier this day and headed across the dirt to hear her sing and commune with her audience, she was very entertaining, funny, and relatable.
Suki Waterhouse-Daisy Jones and the Six keyboardist-she has an amazing voice
Hozier - So fantastic! We saw him at Hinterland a few years ago as well.
We found a delicious ramen place for dinner that night after the show. We were pretty tired and happy to head home after warm, healing bowls of noodles.
Monday- We had a day of exploring vintage shops, boot stores, and boutiques and ended up at Meteor on Congress for an outstanding butternut squash pizza. And then we were off to return our Prius and start the journey home. It is an absolute wonder to have a daughter that makes such a great travel companion. I feel blessed to have that relationship. I'm still missing my mom, my chest still aches from surgery but there is so many happy memories I've made over the last year and ACL will be one that I treasure as we continue on through the years.
