Houston, Texas
Part two of our Texas baseball tour brought us to 102° Houston. Sure, it was ridiculously hot, but we still had a nice visit! Our first stop from the airport was Moon Rabbit for some delicious Vietnamese food, as recommended by our friends Melissa & Henry who generously hosted us for the week.
Dinner at Squable, which was one of our favorites of the whole trip.
There’s only so much walking around you can do when it’s 102° outside, but we did a tiny bit, walking around the Houston Heights neighborhood where we were staying. Breakfast at Torchy’s Tacos.
Of course we visited the local record shop, and I found two to take home! This one, which intriguingly includes “Do You Know The Way to San Jose,” and a record that included the Barber Violin Concerto.
For lunch, Viet-Cajun, which is a specialty of the Houston area! We really liked the crawfish fried rice, but their seafood platter was very dumb with literally 3 pieces of shrimp and a giant bowl of white rice. So don’t order that.
Next door, the Houston Farmers Market! There was a lot to look at here. Apparently the market just moved into their new building last year, and their website says it showcases locally grown produce, but all the produce we saw was from Mexico (per the stickers). Interesting!
I saw so many mangoes at the market, I decided to collect them all and do a taste test. Plus one guava. The favorite was the top one!
We took advantage of free admission to the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston on Thursdays. The thing to know about the MFA is that it’s a huge, sprawling campus, or several campuses, and there are a bunch of different buildings, all of which are not very well explained by the museum. We had a map and still got lost multiple times. But if you’re only going to make a short visit, just go straight to the Kinder Building, which is the newest building that also houses the newest art (contemporary & modern). We loved the light installations in the tunnels, and I was endlessly amused by this video installation, which made people look like zig zags in the direction of their motion.
Yellow light tunnel. Reminded me of that orange day in 2020.
This was part of an entire wall covered in images used to train AI.
And last but not least, this is your chance to see a Yayoi Kusama Infinity Room without the wait. The person just told us to come back in 20 minutes, so we walked around and came back and walked right in. Wild! A Kusama exhibit is coming to San Francisco in October, and I fully expect hours-long lines to get in. And right next to the Infinity Room, a James Turrell installation with no one else there.
A short drive away, another James Turrell, this one on the Rice University campus. We didn’t stay for sundown, but there’s a whole light show programmed for sunset each day.
Dinner at Nancy’s Hustle.
The next day: Pinkerton’s Texas Barbecue.
This time the brisket was great and the ribs were only ok (inverse of Dallas). Also, we haven’t seen this much styrofoam in years. So much styrofoam in Texas.
The view of the Houston skyline from Henry and Melissa’s place! Hot and hazy.
The main event, an Astros game! A surprise bonus, if you bring your Honda key you get special access to the Honda Club Floor, haha. It’s got better AC and fewer people/lines.
Space City! They had a giveaway for our game, which was a Space City jersey similar to their City Connects.
The Astros are the reigning champions from the 2022 World Series. You could say they won last year fairly, but back in 2017 they won with a huge cheating scandal involving stealing signs with video feeds and then banging trash cans to let batters know what was coming. For some reason none of the players received and consequences for this whatsoever. And Houston got to keep their title, and the unfortunate slogan from that year “HISTORY EARNED.” Hah! Jokes! They don’t seem to acknowledge any of this, of course.
Minute Maid Park also has a dome, and it’s much older than the Texas Rangers’ stadium. Unfortunately the air conditioning couldn’t quite keep up with the high temperatures outside, so it was still pretty warm inside. But in most other ways it was nicer than the Rangers’ stadium. Partly, it helps to have a team that has won championships before. But there’s also the fun train filled on the left field side, a nod to the former train station at this location, and there is that whole hallway that’s like a museum – hall of fame.
We spy two former Giants: Mauricio Dubon, and manager Dusty Baker.
Alex got us seats right behind the visitors dugout, which was very fun! We got to see all the players who came up for autographs. I decided to root for my hometown Cincinnati Reds, even though I am also wearing the Space City giveaway jersey from the Astros.
And after the game, the dome opened for a fireworks show. We’ve seen a lot of fireworks shows on our baseball stadium tours!
Saturday started at the Space Center Houston!
The current mission to the moon, Artemis. And me, touching a piece of Mars.
Then we went to walk around the historically gay neighborhood of Montrose, but it was truly too hot to do much walking.
Then our hosts Henry & Melissa were back from vacation, so we met them at 8th Wonder Brewery and then went to nearby Huynh Restaurant for dinner. We had this fried noodle-cake dish that I’ve never tried before, and it was delicious!
Shopping around the Heights with Melissa & Henry.
We went in this antiques shop, and I was of course looking for a mahjong set. Did not find mahjong, but did find this crazy Giants-A’s chess set!! Unfortunately it was $95, which was just too much, even for randomly finding it in Houston. Plus how are you supposed to be able to tell which piece is which? It’s more fun knowing that it exists than actually buying it to play with.
Manready Merchantile.
Lunch over at M-K-T, and a stop at Sam & Davy, where I got this awesome bear-ear hoodie for a friend.
The perfect activity for a too-hot day: the movies. We watched Past Lives, and it was so good. Highly recommend. Afterwards, refreshments at the Heights Bier Garten.
And very excellent pizza, plus live music by a high school band, at The Gypsy Poet.
And on our final morning in Houston, breakfast at Puebla’s Mexican Kitchen. Very good, would definitely do again.
Thank you to Melissa & Henry for such a wonderful time in Houston!
But still booing the Astros who cheated their way to a championship! ?
Anna Wu is a wedding and portrait photographer based in San Francisco. She compulsively documents and blogs all of her daily adventures. Follow her on instagram and view more of her professional work at annawu.com.
