The extended road trip finally arrived at its western terminus in the Texas Hill Country. This also marked my first visit to Burnet County, a rural locale situated northwest of Austin. Locals pronounce it something like BURN-it, and that’s how it felt as the mercury hit 103° Fahrenheit (40° Celsius) each and every day. It had been that way all summer from what I heard, and would continue in the same vein for weeks to come. Grass actually crunched beneath or feet as we walked across lawns, and the breeze only made it feel hotter.
Burnet last appeared in Twelve Mile Circle in 2010. Back then, I noted the county’s exalted placement within the absolute inner circle of Texas Borderlocking. However, it takes an entire article to describe the phenomenon so you’ll need to refer back to it if you don’t understand the reference. Basically, residents of Burnet must travel through at least five other counties if they want to leave the state, creating a unique situation in the U.S. That’s mildly interesting perhaps, but it wasn’t our objective which was entirely family related.
Longhorn Cavern State Park
There’s not a ton of activity in quiet Burnet County, especially when temperatures hit triple digits along with stifling humidity. I wanted to stay inside blasting the the air conditioner to be completely honest. Exploration seemed like the last thing on anyone’s mind. Nonetheless, one nearby attraction seemed promising even under adverse conditions so we headed over to Longhorn Cavern State Park (map). Well most of us did. The younger kid decided he’d rather stay behind and sleep, and I can’t say I blame him.
Some Background
The park’s website calls it “The National Cave of Texas.” That’s cute because, you know, Texas considers itself its own separate country. Lone Star and all that. This whole area falls within the Edwards Plateau as does the rest of the Texas Hill Country, and it all rests upon an expansive bed of limestone. It’s typical of karst topography, pockmarked with characteristic sinkholes, caverns, and aquifers. So I guess it’s a pretty big deal if Texas considers Longhorn as it’s premier cavern.
The Civilian Conservation Corps focused a lot of attention on the park during the 1930’s Great Depression as part of a work relief program. Participants hauled tons of sediment and debris from the cave by hand, making it much more publicly accessible. Then they recycled stones pulled from the depths to build visitor facilities, an observation tower, staircases and walls. We climbed the observation tower and enjoyed the unobstructed view of the rolling terrain around us, but soon had to retreat to the cave under a relentless sun.
Into the Cave
A cave sounded like the perfect place to cool off, and indeed Longhorn Cavern maintains a constant 68°f / 20°c temperature year-round. That’s all I needed to know. We visit caverns frequently as we travel the country so I knew this was perfect. The cavern itself included a nice set of formations and a even few Tricolored Bats (Perimyotis subflavus). Our guide called them Chicken Nuggets and indeed the little critters bore some resemblance to them.
I took this photo at the entrance which sits at the bottom of a sinkhole. The big opening in the ceiling let in a lot of natural light so I got a decent shot for once. Naturally I also took a bunch of pictures inside the cavern although they turned out pretty mediocre which is typical of my cave pictures in general. I never learn my lesson so I have a big collection of less than stellar cave images.
Marble Falls
Afterwards we took a somewhat indirect route to the southern end of Burnet County. Of course it involved county counting. Was there any doubt? So if I swung just a little farther west I could capture Llano County at the town of Kingsland as we drove between Longhorn Cavern and Marble Falls (map). I simply had to cross the border over the Colorado River. It’s ridiculously difficult to capture all 254 counties in Texas and I couldn’t let an easy one get away.
I took the detour and barely added another ten minutes onto our trip into Marble Falls. It’s the biggest town in Burnet County although it’s not really all that big. 7,000 residents is a lot of people out here along the parched savanna.
Double Horn Brewing
Frankly, I drove to Marble Falls to visit a brewery. I’m sure there are all sorts of other wonderful attractions nearby but it was absurdly hot and I was way too unmotivated to ask. Let’s get back in the air conditioning, grab lunch and enjoy a couple of beers instead. Double Horn Brewing did just fine for all that. It became the final brewery of the trip and I added to my list.
But now the road trip ended. We got a pretty good deal on our one-way rental car so we didn’t need to drive 900 miles back to Atlanta. Rather, we dumped the car at the Austin airport and flew directly home.
Articles in the Southern Heat Series
See Also: The Complete Photo Album on Flickr
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