January-March 2016 Issue

The beautiful landscape of the Texas Hill Country has been the subject of countless paintings and photos, drawing people to the area from all over the world. It is here that artists come to be inspired. While there have always been artists in the Hill Country, it seems that the industry has taken off in recent years, and galleries and exhibits abound. Tucked away in the communities that make this area, artists are bus ...

The stirring sound of Highland Bagpipes announced the opening of Highland Games. Members of Silver Thistle Pipes and Drums marched to the stage with precision, pipers piping and drummers drumming. It was a cool misty November day, shrouded in low, gray clouds and as the beautiful notes of the bagpipes rang out, it seemed as if you were in the midst of the Scottish countryside, breathing in the scent of heather on the hills and moors. In real ...

It was a hot afternoon this past July and you could feel the sun beating down, as relentless and burning as a Biblical plague. The grey-bearded old man found the shady spot he was looking for, then slowly began preparing his rig.  It took longer than normal because it had been years since he’d been able to fish this spot.

When I was a little girl growing up in Central America, I loved going to the Mercado. I was blessed to have a Costa Rican mom and an American dad, which resulted in spending the wonder-filled days of my childhood in Costa Rica. We lived in the capital city of San Jose and its Mercado Central is huge, taking up a full city block.

THE WEARIN’ O’ THE GREEN The green harp flag was used by the Irish Catholic Confederation of Ireland at least as early as the 1640s.  In the 1790s, rebels in Ireland adopted green, both the fabric and the shamrock, as a symbol of their unity against English loyalists.  The original ballad, “The Wearing of the Green” refers to this uprising and tells the story of a revolutionary immigrant who explains and laments that wearin’ o’ the green has been ...

Small towns in Texas find ways to go from just a spot along the road on the way to someplace else to a distinctive stop along that road. Luling and nearby Gonzales are good examples of that. You might just be dashing through and not notice a thing except a stop light, but stop for a bit, look around, and what you’ll find is likely to surprise you and keep you busy all day long.

Learn all about nature in the Hill Country, up close and personal, during the 16th annual Nature Quest this April. During the Nature Quest, you’ll learn from experts about all facets of the Hill Country—bats, birds, butterflies, insects, champion big trees, flowers, natural history, native plants, wildlife habitats, rivers, and more. Around the Concan-Utopia area of the scenic western Hill Country, you’ll get to go on scenic field trips, attend works ...

  Situated on a shady stretch of San Antonio’s inviting River Walk is one of the city’s newest cultural attractions, the Briscoe Western Art Museum. Since opening in October of 2014, this attrctive and very visitor-friendly collection (comfortably and attractively housed in the fully modernized and beautifully restored original San An ...