• Step into the past in Dallas' West End Historic District (website: www.dallaswestend.org), a collection of beautifully restored 100-year-old historical buildings turned into museums, shops, restaurants and nightlife.

• Ride the glass elevator to the top of the 50-storey Reunion Tower, belonging to the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Dallas. It has observation terraces and a revolving restaurant with nighttime dancing.

• Ride for big thrills at Six Flags Over Texas theme park (website: www.sixflags.com), fun for all the family.

• Catch a movie, attend a comedy show, or dance the night away at Sundance Square (website: www.sundancesquare.com), in downtown Fort Worth. This popular entertainment district also has a log-cabin village, zoological park and a Japanese garden.

• Enjoy fishing, boating and swimming at Highland Lakes, in central Texas (website: www.highlandlakes.com). Take a wine-tasting trip to award-winning wineries in the surrounding scenic hill country.

• Wear your swimsuits to Splashtown, a water recreation park near Houston with dozens of splashy water rides, slides, chutes and floats.

• Tour San Antonio's Paseo del Rio (Riverwalk) (website: www.thesanantonioriverwalk.com), a unique shopping and entertainment area that sparkles like a fairyland at night.

• Sign up for an adventure camp at Sea World of Texas (website: www.seaworld.com). Hang out with penguins, sea lions and coral reef fish, and learn about the private life of marine mammals.

• Become a real cowboy on a working ranch holiday in the hill country to the west of San Antonio, near Bandera (website: www.banderacowboycapital.com), the ‘Cowboy Capital of the World'.

• Discover the Texas Gulf Coast playground of Padre Island (website: www.nps.gov/pais), a narrow 170km (95-mile) barrier island with watersports, fishing centres and an impressive expanse of protected National Seashore, wildlife refuges and birdlife sites. It is connected to Corpus Christi by a causeway.

• Visit the romantic 32-mile long Galveston Island (website: www.galveston.com), just 40 minutes south of Houston. The island is rich in history and pirate lore and noted for its sandy beaches, fishing, watersports and turn-of-the-century architecture.

• Visit Palo Duro Canyon State Park (website: www.palodurocanyon.com), near Amarillo. The park has dramatic coloured rock formations, is popular for hiking, picnicking, camping and horse riding, and has a rich history of nomadic tribes that hunted mammoth and large game animals.

• See spectacular views of stark desert, forests, mountains and canyons carved by the Rio Grande at Big Bend National Park (website: www.nps.gov/bibe), south of El Paso. Hiking and rafting, especially in the Santa Elena canyon, are popular. 

• Explore Space Center Houston (website: www.spacecenter.org) - the official visitor center of NASA's Johnson Space Center. Climb aboard a computer simulator, touch a moon rock, see a full-size space shuttle replica, see astronauts train for missions, or take a behind-the-scenes tour of NASA.

See Contact Addresses for further tourist information.