Things You Can Skip If You’re Pressed For Time

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Austin is a great city with many attractions, but sometimes you don’t have time to see them all. If you can't do everything, go ahead and skip these Austin staples and try something else.

SKIP: Oasis on Lake Travis—This Tex-Mex restaurant is known for the sunset and not much else. Many Austinites will tell you that an Oasis sunset is something you shouldn’t miss, but after waiting about three hours for table (and about 30 minutes searching for a parking spot), the sunset just doesn’t seem as great.

ALTERNATIVE: Southwest Bistro at Hyatt Regency—This restaurant resides on the other side of the Congress bridge from the Austin Convention Center, so it’s much closer, and still provides beautiful sunsets with Tex-Mex cuisine.

SKIP: Austin Duck Adventures—This tour includes an amphibious tour of downtown Austin and Lake Austin in vehicle that goes from land to water. It’s nice to be able to see all of the landmarks in Austin, but depending on your location within the vehicle, you can’t see much.

ALTERNATIVE: Haunted Ghost Tours—These tours can be done walking or on the historic trolley. If you are really into history and the paranormal, skip the tours and go straight to ghost hunting with the team featured on PBS "Haunted Texas" and the Biography Channel's "My Ghost Story.”

SKIP: IMAX Theatre—Of course everything is bigger and better in Texas, but our IMAX theatre is the same size as all of the rest across the country, so go ahead and skip this theatre.

ALTERNATIVE: Alamo Drafthouse—Eat, drink, and be merry all while watching a movie at the Alamo Drafthouse. Alamo shows all of the current movies as well as fun sing-a-longs and cult classics, turning a movie experience into interactive entertainment. 

>> Check out the NIWeek Pinterest board for more things to do around Austin.

Photo by Matthew Whitehead