Today was yet another fun and interesting day. Joe had off from work and Grace took a half day so that we could run about and do some fun stuff. Joe had been talking about taking me to this place called "Camp," which is owned by his uncle. It's a piece of property outside of Austin with a little cabin and a creek running through the back. This creek feeds into a bigger river and there is a canoe there. Joe couldn't find his keys though, so we couldn't go in the cabin or unlock the canoe. Silly Joe.

The creek and river were super icky from the storms last week, which caused debris to clog up the water flow, so we did not go swimming. We walked around a bit, peeked into the empty houses of the neighbors (almost no one lives in any of these houses, they just keep them on the property), swung on some swings, and chatted. A good part of the day indeed.

After that we went over to Barton Springs Pool. This is actually a river that has been made into a pool. There are steps to get in, and cement sides, but the bottom is all natural and it is not closed off from the regular flow of water. Because of this, it is a public pool that needs no chemicals added to it, in order to keep it clean. This place was a right good time. Joe had been promising me swimming all week, and this place was exactly the kind of place I wanted to swim. Natural, but still big enough to allow for proper swimming. Grace also requested that I mention that this was probably the biggest pool I had ever swam in. I admit it is quite large.

Joe had also been telling me about the Congress Avenue Bridge, which is home to the world's largest urban bat colony. At night you can sit under the bridge, or stand on it and watch the bats fly out. I could not believe the endless stream of bats flying out of this bridge! We were there for a long time and there was no end to them. We left before the numbers had tapered off. It was so amazing to see thousands of these little creatures flying off. I can also say that while we were there I was not being eaten by mosquitoes, like I have been for the majority of this trip.

We headed back to Joe's place so that he and I could pack up. Joe is leaving in the morning for Mexico to go on a caving trip he's been planning for a long time. He's going to the worlds largest known cave shaft in the world, Golondrinas Cave. He is going to drop down on rope into this huge opening, which could fit the entire Empire State Building. I informed him that if he chickened out, we could no longer be friends. I also informed him that if he died, I would be very upset. He'll be ok.