Arizona State Fair

As we pulled into Phoenix for the Arizona State Fair, we knew we wanted to end this year’s tour across America with a bang, and that’s exactly what we plan to do! These folks in Arizona are wild about Texas and we’re happy to tell them all about it. We’re wrapping up our tour but there’s still a couple more days to come and check out Tje Austin on the entertainment stage and explore the waterways of Texas on our virtual kayaks! We’ll be here through Friday, so if you’re in the area come on out and say howdy!


As the sun is setting on Texas on Tour for this year, we look forward to what adventures lie ahead in 2011. We've had an awesome year full of many memories and many friends made along the way. If we didn't visit your city during the 2010 tour, perhaps we will be making a stop in 2011 somewhere near you.



Please check www.texasontour.com early next year to see our updated schedule and if we're close, come by and learn what Texas is all about. If you simply cannot wait until next year to see us again, go ahead and visit Texas for the real deal! You're always welcome!

Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta

At our stop at the Albuquerque Balloon Fiesta, Texas on Tour is proud to welcome one of our sponsors -- SeaWorld San Antonio, and their furry -- and not so furry -- friends. Representatives from SeaWorld have been entertaining, educating, and encouraging people to travel to Texas and make San Antonio their next vacation destination. Guests to Texas on Tour were surprised to see appearances made by a lemur, wallaby, alligator and boa constrictor! It's amazing how animals can bring smiles to the faces of everyone in attendance.

The Albuquerque Balloon Fiesta is well known for its incredible hot air balloons shaped like animals, but attendees never imagined that they would see real live animals at the Texas on Tour exhibit! For more information on how you can visit SeaWorld San Antonio check out www.seaworld.com.

Along with our friends from SeaWorld, we also have Tje Austin playing on the entertainment stage in the afternoons. So Texas on Tour is the place to be! Check out the video clip to see Tje singing a song from his latest album Xperience.




If you live in Albuquerque or are going to be in the area, check out Texas on Tour and SeaWorld at the Albuquerque Balloon Fiesta through Sunday, October 10th. If you can’t make it to Albuquerque, then I sure hope we get to see you at the Arizona State Fair in Phoenix. I hate to say it folks, but that will be our final stop for the 2010 tour. So come out and visit us!

LA County Fair

We had a fantastic time at the LA County Fair and the thing we will remember the most is the people we met during this event. The state motto of Texas is “Friendship” and we definitely made some new friends in Southern California. Guests enjoyed “Ride the Texas Waterways” in our virtual-reality kayaks since there aren’t many places to kayak in Pomona. With temperatures reaching well into the 100s, visitors said the only thing that would have made the kayaks better was if you actually got sprayed with real water to cool off. I guess they’ll just have to schedule a trip to Texas for the real thing!

At our LA County Fair stop, we were also introduced to Tje Austin – a musician from Austin. He treated fair-goers every night to a free show at the Texas on Tour Entertainment Stage. Tje is a talented young up-and-coming artist who performs original songs and puts his own unique spin on R&B classics. We had several visitors come back night after night just to catch Tje’s performances. Tje will be joining us for the remainder of our tour, so if you can make it out I strongly encourage it.

Well friends, another Texas on Tour event has wrapped up and now we are up, up, and away to the Albuquerque Balloon Fiesta in Albuquerque, NM. I really hope to see you there!

Taste of Colorado

People flocked to the Taste of Colorado in Denver looking for fantastic food. Some of the finest restaurants in the Mile High City were featured with an estimated 500,000 people in attendance at this year's festival. Not only did they find great eats, they were also treated to a unique taste of Texas.

The Texas on Tour Discover Texas dome was a popular attraction, especially when the temperature went above 90 degrees outside. It's always a comfortable 70 degrees inside our larger-than-life dome, providing the perfect place to escape the summer heat. Even though we didn't have any food to offer, people still left us knowing more about the great state of Texas than when they entered. My favorite fact to share is that Texas has so many BBQ places that you could eat BBQ at a different spot every day of the year!

With Colorado just a short drive away from Texas, people were excited to learn that they could experience their very own taste of Texas, easy as pie! Texas on Tour will miss Colorado but, now we are heading west to the great LA County Fair in Pomona, CA. Hope to see you there!

Iowa State Fair

The smell of funnel cakes, the screams coming from the midway rides, and the sight of fireworks in the warm summer sky can only mean one thing – a fair is underway.

The Iowa State Fair is in full swing and Texas on Tour was lucky enough to be part of this year’s festivities. Crowds close to 1 million visit this Iowa attraction every summer, and this year was no different. In fact, almost half of the state of Iowa attends the fair. Many of the fairgoers were in for quite the surprise when they realized Texas was here, and they were even more surprised that it didn't cost a thing to experience the exhibit. We had so many people ask how many tickets to they needed to get in. When we told them it was all free, they almost didn't believe us! Maybe what they say is true...the best things in life ARE free!

We have a little something for everyone at Texas on Tour no matter what your age. We had people from 9 to 90 take a step into Texas. We also saw many faces make repeat visits to our exhibit just because they had so much fun. We even had trivia contests and bean bag toss competitions throughout the day where fairgoers had the chance to take home a souvenir from Texas on Tour. At various points throughout the day, we even had more people than some of the carnival games! : ) Now it's time to say Bye-owa to Iowa and drive off into the sunset towards Denver, where we are looking forward to what Colorado is cooking up at the Taste of Colorado.

Justin Herman Plaza

San Francisco marked the halfway point on our tour across the United States, educating and entertaining crowds with the sights and sounds of the Great State of Texas. The Golden State was happy to have Texas as their neighbor for a few days. We set up shop right in the heart of San Francisco’s financial district so lots of business men and women visited throughout the day. What a great way to spend their breaks from work with a quick trip to Texas. As soon as they stepped into our footprint they were magically transformed into the wide open plains and prairies of Texas. Our huge Dome Theater and Kayak Adventure allowed guests to leave behind the concrete jungle of San Francisco and escape to a much more tranquil place in Texas. We had tons of guests tell us that they never even knew Texas had water for kayaking. Boy are they wrong! With over 624 miles of coastline and nearly 200,000 miles of lakes and rivers, Texas is a kayakers dream. We noticed that quite a few workers spent 45 minutes or more of their 30 minute lunch breaks in Texas because they were enjoying it so much. Hopefully their bosses believed them when they told them they came back to work late because they were in Texas.


To top off our time in San Francisco, the Old 97's played to a packed crowd at 5pm right when everyone was getting off work. What a great way to relax and unwind after a stressful day of work! Next time these business professionals are planning their vacation we hope Texas is right at the top of their list. We are heading back east now to visit our friends in Des Moines, Iowa at the Iowa State Fair to spread the good news about Texas.

Chicago Navy Pier

Texas on Tour blew into the "Windy City" and transformed Navy Pier into a slice of Texas. If you didn’t know, everything's bigger in Texas, and we went as big as we possibly could for Chi-Town. We brought in tons of sand which was transformed, over 4 days, into a spectacular life-sized sandcastle. The crowd watched in awe as the sand artists worked their magic. If the sandcastle wasn't enough to impress Chicago, 2008 World Champion Trick Roper Kevin Fitzpatrick and his son Will sure were. The dynamic duo from Bandera wowed crowds with rope tricks. Spectators really enjoyed the father-son team as they lassoed people over to the display to learn about Texas.

To top it all off we were treated to a visit by two of the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders! Lines formed fast and the ladies stayed plenty busy signing autographs and taking photos with all the fans. It was truly an action-packed event and Texas on Tour made an impression and left a mark in the hearts and minds of Chicago. Texas on Tour heads west next and it’s sure to be a San Francisco treat!

South Street Seaport

The Lone Star State took a bite of the Big Apple as Texas on Tour set up shop at the South Street Seaport in NYC. Our street team created an awesome pre-event buzz around Manhattan leading up to the event that got the city chatting and drove people in the thousands down to the Seaport to visit Texas and to take in a free concert by the Old 97's on July 4th. New Yorkers were treated to an Independence Day they will never forget - Texas style -- and the Old 97's supplied plenty of fireworks on the stage. Thousands of fans packed the Pier to listen to the sounds of this native Texas band as we celebrated the freedom of our fine country. Several groups of students, who were on summer vacation, came by to spend some time with us at Texas on Tour. In fact, a group of four college juniors told me that after coming through our interactive experience they made the decision to make South Padre Island, TX their Spring Break destination next year. The Texas sun has set on "the city that never sleeps" and it's time to travel to "the windy city" -- Chicago, IL. Texas on Tour will make Navy Pier our new backyard as we continue to travel the U.S. to share the love of Texas with the rest of the world.

CMA Festival

The stars are big in Texas, but the stars that were performing at the CMA Fest in Nashville, TN were even bigger! Texas on Tour made its way to Music City for the biggest Country Music Festival in the world. When the sun set, the stars came out and performed to sold out crowds every night. This year CMA Festival set a record for the most people in attendance ever and 100% of the proceeds from the festival are always donated to worthy causes. This year 50% went to saving music in our schools program, and the other 50% went to flood relief in Nashville. Both very good causes and we were glad that Texas On Tour was a part of this great event.

Not only was the CMA Festival packed, but it was packed with people from all over the country as well as all over the world. They all wanted to know more about what Texas has to offer, which goes to show you that Texas has international appeal. When folks weren’t enjoying one of our many experiences, they were participating in one of our contests. The Texas on Tour team and I thoroughly enjoy challenging everyone on their knowledge of Texas trivia and the question that always stumps people is the fact that Texas only has one natural lake. Do you know which lake is the only natural lake in the state of Texas?


If you know the answer then I encourage you to visit us at our next stop: South Street Seaport in New York City. Heck -- I want you to stop by even if you don’t know the answer! Stay tuned for more from the road and check out our schedule so you can come experience all the sights and sounds from Texas on Tour right in your own backyard.

Wichita Riverfest

Texas on Tour opened the curtains on the 2010 road show at Riverfest in Wichita, Kansas. People flock every year to Riverfest for good times and great music. At Texas on Tour we were able to supply them with both.

The smooth guitar riffs and vocals of Austin, Texas native Ryan Harkrider filled the air of downtown Wichita from our stage. Ryan brought his authentic Austin sound from the "Live Music Capital of the World" all the way to Riverfest. A fan named Cookie approached Ryan and she told him that she had written a song, but didn't have a melody to go with it. Ryan solved that problem quickly. In a matter of minutes Ryan had composed a song to fit her lyrics perfectly. After a short rehearsal, Cookie and Ryan were ready to perform.

With Cookie on the mic and Ryan backing her up on lead guitar. The song named "Going to Nashville" turned out to be a hit with everyone in attendance. A fitting title for the song considering Nashville is stop #2 on our trip throughout the U.S. spreading the good news about Texas and all it has to offer. Stay tuned to read more about the experiences from the road with Texas on Tour.