Day 9: Austin

Today was our last day with Panda and Chalupa.  After a great scramble cooked by Chalupa for breakfast we sat around and shared stories for a while.  Then it was off for coffee and lunch.  Lunch was Mexican at a food cart.  Talk about yummy!  Imagine breaded, deep fried avocado in a taco shell.  This was followed by giant doughnuts at another truck called Gordoughs!.  Then it was time for Panda and Chalupa to go to the airport for their trip home.

 

 Lefty and Bug had $30 in “Cars-to-go” credit burning a hole in their pockets so they went off to find a car and give it a try.  For those of you who have never heard of “Cars-to-go”, what a great thing!  They are Smart Cars parked (seemingly) randomly around the city.  You pay an annual fee to join (but Bear, Bug and Lefty got free memberships as part of their race packets) and then 38¢ per minute to drive the car.  Sounds like a lot but remember they are for getting from here to there and that includes the insurance and gas.  When you get where you are going you just park them on the street, sign out and walk away.  This means they can be anywhere in the city.  This is where that ubiquitous smart phone comes in handy.  There is an app that allows you to look up the location of all the Cars-to-go in your area.  We used them when we were in Washington D.C. in June and they were a kick.  Bear said they were lots of fun to drive.  At the race we learned that Cars-to-go is coming to Seattle next.

Bear and I came back to the condo to rest and read.  We have a balcony with really comfortable lounge chairs on it so we enjoyed sitting out there with the doors open so the air conditioning could waft over us.  Dinner was more great barbecue at a place called Blue Star Barbecue just a couple blocks from the condo.