Where to stay in Austin, TX?

Travel, Wine Tourism, and Restaurants Forum
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My wife and I are heading to Austin for 4-5 days in March. No specific plans - just hoping to have fun. Our current question is, what part of town would folks recommend staying in? Looks like there are hotels all over the place. We’d like to be somewhere close to shopping and restaurants, and also somewhere that might be reasonable to walk around at night without concern. If those don’t co-exist, the former would be the preference.

Thanks for any guidance. I’m sure we’ll have more questions as planning unfolds. And I did see plenty of BBQ joint posts here, which were great to read. Good brisket is one of our favorite foods!

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We’re headed there soon. Staying in Travis Heights. Close to downtown but far enough that there is plenty of places to walk and bike and seems lots to do on South Congress.

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Just kind of depends on what you are wanting to do. I prefer to walk Rainey St. at night to bar hop and grab food from trucks rather than 6th st. It’s a bit less seedy and weird. I’ve stayed at the Fairmont and Kimpton Van Zandt in that area and both are phenomenal. Never felt unsafe walking late at night and it’s central to everything.

There’s some high end shopping up at the domain area in north austin and places to walk to at night for food and bars. It is really far from downtown though; a good 10 miles or so.
I’d recommend looking at the Archer for that area. I haven’t stayed at that property specifically, but I like their sister properties.

Somewhere along south congress can be a happy medium. Close to downtown, but a little more quiet. I’ve had friends recommend the South Congress Hotel.

I’m sure you already know…but don’t miss Franklins BBQ. Get there early, bring some beer, snag a lawn chair, and make some friends. The experience is part of the fun. The brisket is out of this world.
If you want some atypical BBQ, check out Kemuri Tatsu Ya. Feels like an authentic Japanese izakaya, but they have a cool Texas twist on Japanese. Yakitori skewers, Ribs with yuzu, etc. It was awesome.

If you’re looking for something to do outdoors. Grab a picnic and head to Zilker park. There’s some nice walking trails in the area.

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Perfect timing for this topic. We are meeting 2 couples in Austin 2/23-2/27 and we are staying at the Fairmont. I welcome any nearby art, food, shopping or other fun recommendations . Thanks in advance.

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I’ve been to Austin several times and stayed at the W and the Hilton. Both are acceptable for quality of hotel/location, etc (Though maybe its been 10 years since I was at the W, whereas I was at the Hilton about 2-3 weeks before the Pandemic in Feb 2020.) I have friends there so they usually take us around and stuff so I cannot say I have my bearings too well on the city.

If you like BBQ, and you have 4 days, may I suggest a trip down to Lockhart, TX? You have Blacks, Smitty’s and Kreuz Market. Very authentic traditional BBQ in a small little town. cute town square, a few shops, but really go there just for the BBQ experience. And again if you have a car and want to explore outside the city, look at Jester King Brewery.

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I’d stay at the Kimpton so I could enjoy Rainey St each evening - dinner at G’raj Mahal a must. I’ve stayed at the Hilton which was fine for large, conference center hotel and the various regular hotels around the conference center are fine and not a long walk to Rainey as well. Not a 6th St fan … usually have at least one meal at the Kerbey Lane on Guadalupe for queso and/or pancakes and people watching. Love Maudies II for Texmex. My son lives in Austin - has for almost 20 years … we tend to stick to the little fun only in Austin weird spots and have fun. Also really enjoy the Blanton Art Museum.

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Anybody stay at The Line? Any good restaurants w/i walking distance?

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In general, most of Austin is pretty safe for walking around at night. I would, however, stay away from “Dirty Sixth” (the part of 6th street between Congress Ave. and I-35). This tends to be the realm of young folks looking for shot bars. To the extent Austin nightlife gets aggro, this is where it tends to happen.

I would gravitate towards Rainey Street area, downtown/west 2nd, 3rd, 4th streets, west 6th street (roughly along 6th street from San Antonio west to MOPAC – although the offerings west of Lamar get fewer and farther between), SOCO (South Congress from about Academy south to Johanna), and the Eastside (starting at about Comal and going east to about Chicon along 5th, 6th, and 7th streets.

If you want to walk from a hotel, the downtown/Rainey Street/2nd-3rd-4th street areas are pretty accessible from the downtown hotels (2 Marriotts, the Stephen F. Austin Intercontinental, 4 Seasons, the Driskill). You could probably do these areas from Rainey street as well – staying at the Fairmont or the Hotel Van Zandt. Other areas probably require a car or Uber ride to get to from downtown (or to get to downtown from those areas). The additional benefit of staying downtown (or in the Rainey street area) is that you can walk the trail along Town Lake (an ~10 mile loop right in the middle of Austin).

As to good restaurants, I recommend the following:

Emmer & Rye (Rainey street area)
Lenoir (on South 1st street)
ATX Cocina (downtown on west Cesar Chavez)
Comedor (corner of Colorado and 5th)
Qi or Lin Asian (Qi is on west 6th at Bowie, Lin Asian is farther along on west 6th at Harthan) These are owned by the same folks. Qi is fancier, Lin Asian is more casual. Both serve more or less the same stuff – delicious Chinese food – especially the soup dumplings (Yum!)
Red Ash (downtown)
Terry Black’s (BBQ just south of Town Lake on Barton Springs Road, my favorite BBQ in town)
Il Brutto (Eastside along 6th street)
Nightcap (west 6th street at Pressler – kind of half bar/half restaurant, not fancy food but delicious and nice folks – this was our neighborhood spot before we moved farther into downtown in December)

A couple of cool bars (at least they were prior to the pandemic keeping me from going out to bars):

Small Victory (on 7th street just east of the Stephen F. Austin Hotel)
Garage bar (on Colorado b/t 5th and 6th streets, in a parking garage)

The Domain also has a lot of restaurants/bars, but is a little bit too “Outdoor Mall” for me.

I’ve tried to recommend more “upscale” spots, but if you want some reccos for old-time-Austin-dive-spots, let me know.

1 Like
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As long as you aren’t going 11-20 March plus a day or two on either side of those dates, you shouldn’t have any problems finding a good place to stay. But during SXSW, all booked up and if anything is available, it will cost three or more times what it would otherwise.

https://www.experism.com/austin/march

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I appreciate all of the recommendations so far, and would definitely be interested in the “old-time-Austin-dive-spots,” as well, Greg.

Thanks, all!

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Andrew, if you like big old/historic hotels in the vein of the Brown Palace in Denver or the Pfister in Milwaukee, you’ll like the Driskill. I did.

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I stayed at the Hilton for a sales meeting last year and it was fine. They had an excellent and well priced bourbon list.

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We hit Terry Black’s BBQ yesterday - fantastic, and much better than Cooper’s, which a local recommended to us. The brisket, jalapeño cheddar sausage, and peach cobbler were all top notch.

A great local recommendation, on the other hand, was Licha’s Cantina on E. 6th. It’s a little wooden house. Authentic Tex-Mex and really good. Had some tasty mixed drinks there, too.

We ended up booking an Air B&B literally 100 yards from the top of Rainey St., so have spent a lot of time there catching live music and cold beverages. Right on Rainey, Banger’s was a good spot for dinner the other night. Dozens of housemade sausages, live blues, and 100 beers on tap.

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Popping back in to add that we had a good visit to Lazarus Brewing Company on Friday. It’s a spacious spot with plenty of outdoor seating, lots of good beers on tap, and delicious street tacos.

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El Alma, Peche, and Garrison were all great meals when we were there last month.

The Fairmont was an excellent hotel.