Austin

What it's known for

Austin is the capital of Texas and home of the University of Texas at Austin. Its official slogan calls it 'The Live Music Capital of the World', it hosts the South by Southwest (SXSW) festivals, and as tech companies moved in, it adopted the nickname 'Silicon Hills' in the 1990s.

Fun facts

1. The city is named after Stephen F. Austin, the 'Father of Texas', and for a short time it was called Waterloo.
2. The Texas State Capitol, built from local red granite between 1882 and 1888, is taller than the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C.
3. Every summer a huge colony of Mexican free-tailed bats, up to 1.5 million of them, lives under the Congress Avenue Bridge and flies out at dusk to feed.