2 Best Sights in Austin, Texas

This 12-mile series of hike-and-bike trails follows the contour of Barton Creek and the canyon it created west along an 8-mile-long area from Zilker Park to west of Loop 360. The popular Greenbelt features even more sought-after swimming holes when the creek is full (very rain-dependent, it's usually in spring and fall). Several access points will get you on the riverside trails, including at Zilker Park, Loop 360, Twin Falls, Scottish Woods Trail Falls (near the intersection of MoPac and Loop 360), and Scottish Woods Trail (at the trail's northern border, off Loop 360).

The former site of temporary Franciscan missions in the 1700s and a former Native American gathering place is now Austin's everyday backyard park. The enormous 351-acre site that sprawls along the shores of Lady Bird Lake includes Barton Springs Pool, numerous gardens, a meditation trail, and a Swedish log cabin dating from the 1840s. In the spring, the park hosts a kite festival as well as concerts in the park's Zilker Hillside Theater, a natural outdoor amphitheater beneath a grove of century-old pecan trees; in July and August, musicals and plays take over. And, of course, the annual Austin City Limits Music Festival rules here every year in October.