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Slide down a snowy mountain and 9 more Texas travel tidbits in November

JW Marriott Hill Country Resort & Spa holiday activation

Take a slide down Snow Flow Mountain in the Hill Country.

Photo courtesy of JW Marriott Hill Country Resort & Spa

Thanksgiving is barely on the horizon, but places all over Texas are getting a head start on the holiday season's festivities. Can't decide where to take a quick vacation, road trip, or staycation? Here are 10 events, special celebrations, and hotel happenings to help plan a getaway in November.

In the Hill Country

Texans on fall getaways will find a winter wonderland at the JW Marriot San Antonio Hill Country Resort & Spa, starting already on November 11. The popular resort's Hill Country Christmas adventures are rolling out several familiar and brand new immersive experiences. Resort guests and visitors can slide down Snow Flow Mountain, sing their favorite holiday carols with Mrs. Claus, decorate gingerbread houses, participate in a Secret Santa Scavenger hunt, and more. Ticket prices range from from $12.99 to $39.99 for different activities, and bundle ticket pricing is available. The Hill Country Christmas experiences will run until December 31.

For even more Hill Country holiday revelry, travelers can take a spin on the ice rink at the Hill Country Galleria in Bee Cave, beginning November 10. The Galleria is bringing the wintery activity back this year after its highly successful debut season in 2022. The ice rink will be open daily at varying hours, and reservations are encouraged. Tickets for a 60-minute skate session are $15 each, which also includes the skate rental.

Weekend holiday events are also ramping up in the Gruene Historic District in New Braunfels, but visitors can catch live music in the small town every day, all year. The Grapevine Garden's monthly "Come and Taste It" event falls on November 16, and is open to the public for all to share in delightful Texas wines and craft beer. Riding in for some early Christmas cheer, Cowboy Kringle will visit Gruene for special photo sessions with families from November 18-19 and 24-26. If you're hanging around the small town on the first weekend for Cowboy Kringle, make sure to stick around for the Old Gruene Market Days to shop the many vendors selling handmade items and locally made food.

Around Central Texas

Waco's Fixer Upper royalty Chip and Joanna Gaines are resuming tours of their century-old "Cottonwood Castle," which they spent years renovating and showcased on TV last fall. One-hour, guided walking tours that explore its design and history will be offered Mondays through Saturdays, for a limited time. Tour tickets are available online in timed intervals from 9 am to 12:30 pm through January 31, 2024. Tickets are $50 (children under four are free), and groups of six or more can receive a 10 percent discount.

Just down the road, the Gaineses' fixed-up Hotel 1928 also officially opens for reservations on November 1. The 33-room, luxe boutique hotel sits in the historic Grand Karem Shrine Building in downtown Waco and is named for the year in which it was completed. Rates start at $375 per night. Hotel 1928 will get its own weekly TV series, Fixer Upper: The Hotel, beginning 8 pm November 8 on Magnolia Network.

In Austin

One of the city's oldest hotels, The Stephen F. Austin Royal Sonesta Hotel, recently welcomed the arrival of its new royal mascot. The Baron of Austin is an ode to The Hippopotamus Lounge and Piano Bar, which previously occupied the second-story bar and terrace during the "early 20th century." To celebrate, the hotel has created the swanky "Baron of Austin Experience Package" in partnership with the Austin Zoo. Guests who book a stay in one of the luxurious suites using the promo code "BARON" will receive two free admission passes to the zoo, cocktail vouchers for "The Basking Baron" (a secret menu specialty cocktail from Stephen F's Bar and Terrace), and 10 percent of the proceeds from the stay will be donated to the zoo. Nightly rates for suites begin at the princely sum of $729.

The banks of Waller Creekwill soon be aglow with illuminated art installations as part of Waterloo Greenway's free creek show, which has been a must-see annual event since 2014. Visitors can experience Austin in a whole new light and walk along 9th Street to Waterloo Park to experience the eye-catching artwork from November 10-18. This year's show features six new light-based art pieces created by local artists and designers. The show will run from 6 pm to 10 pm.

For a Dallas staycation...

November 22, 2023 marks the 60th anniversary of President John F. Kennedy's assassination in Dallas, and The Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza will acknowledge the sad occasion with a special exhibition opening November 8. "Two Days in Texas" will revisit the former president's November 1963 trip to Texas through eyewitness accounts and his own words. Original film footage, photographs, news articles, and more will be drawn from the museum’s collection of more than 95,000 artifacts relating to the assassination. Never-before-seen video of Kennedy's motorcade will also be debuted during the exhibition, which will run until June 16, 2024. "Two Days in Texas" is included with the price of admission ($18 for adults until December 31, and $22 beginning January 1, 2024).

The Ritz-Carlton, Dallas partnered with Texas-based design firm Rottet Studio for a multimillion-dollar renovation that, it promises, "redefines the standards of opulence." The hotel's public areas, Club Lounge, and all of the 218 guest rooms and suites have gotten their own upgrades with new luxurious amenities. The Ritz-Carlton, Dallas is offering a limited time “Destination Dallas” package to celebrate the renovations through March 31, 2024. Guests can book one of the hotel’s deluxe city-view guest rooms using the code "CUE" and receive breakfast for two, a surprise welcome amenity, a 20 percent discount on spa services, and two tickets for the JFK Trolley Tour. Room rates for the package begin at $1,079 per night in November.

Over in Fort Worth...

Even before the official Christmas in the Fort Worth Stockyards celebration in December, the holidays arrive with the Stockyards Rodeo Rink gliding in on November 20, along with several other spirited Christmas activities. Santa's Grand Arrival Parade and Tree Lighting Ceremony will take place right after Thanksgiving on November 24, and visitors can grab photos with Cowboy Santa on Wednesdays through Sundays starting that same day until December 24. Mrs. Claus will hold her classic story time hour for families on Thanksgiving weekend and into December.

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Uptown News

Euro-style Hotel St. Germain in Uptown Dallas closed after 33 years

Google Maps / Flashback Dallas

Hotel St. Germain

A darling boutique hotel in Uptown Dallas that was Dallas' first B&B has closed: Hotel St. Germain, which occupied a turn-of-the-century home at 2516 Maple St., closed its doors and auctioned off its furnishings in an estate sale that took place November 8-10.

A friend of the family that owned the hotel confirmed that it had been closed for nearly a year, and that the property was recently sold to an undisclosed buyer who intends to maintain its lodging status.

It's in a prime location, since Maple Avenue is currently going through a major turnover from bumpy little street to the home of big projects like Maple Terrace, the 22-story residential tower at 3003 Maple Ave.

Hotel St. Germain was opened in 1991 by businesswoman and former New Orleans resident Claire Heymann, the granddaughter of a Paris antiques dealer, who did exactly what preservationists dream about: She took a crumbling old home built in 1900 and transformed it, giving it a stunning makeover and filling it with fine art and antiques: one-of-a-kind sleigh beds, spindly antique desks, amber wall sconces, vintage bathroom fittings, and sparkling crystal chandeliers.

The property had only seven rooms, each unique, and was Dallas' first bed-and-breakfast inn. It also had a quirky in-house restaurant featuring acclaimed chefs of the day such as William Guthrie.

It's disappointing to have missed the sale with its assortment of leaded glass windows, vintage sinks, chandeliers, and French antique furniture.

Flashback Dallas shares a history of the structure, and food writer Mark Stuertz (who co-authored Fork Fight!, the memoir by Pei Wei co-founder Mark Brezinski) wrote a great review of the restaurant in 1997, recounting its colorful past.

"Heymann discovered the property in the late '80s, then a foreclosed, boarded-up hovel facing a wrecking ball, while scouring the area between McKinney and Turtle Creek for an old house worthy of conversion into a small, stylish hotel similar to those she had visited on numerous jaunts to San Francisco," he wrote.

Heymann named it for the St. Germain area of Paris, and filled it with elegant furnishings, many from her antiques dealer mother. Stuertz called the result "an odd mix of romance, quaintness, European-style finery, and antique-collector busyness," "stuffed with fabrics fussily pleated, puddled, lashed and tasseled, as well as handsome furnishings seasoned with art deco accents and shabby chic touches."

The closure was due in part to the fact that Heymann has been suffering from Alzheimer's Disease and is in a nursing home.

Gary Bellomy, who worked at the hotel, posted an elegy on Facebook, calling her "one of the most complicated and brilliant women I have known."

"Hotel St. Germain, her mad, brilliant brainstorm joins the ranks of Dallas’ unique history," he said. "Many of you will mourn. It is unlikely we will ever see this level of French sophistication in this spot we call home."

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