“This is Austin. People go downtown, and that’s all they ever see, but this is Austin.”

Rotarian W. Gaines Bagby has driven me north from downtown, then west into a tangle of twisting, rolling roads. “You remember how the land to the east was so flat?” he asks. “Now you’re in hill country.” The hills start abruptly, as if a giant had been running and the carpet rippled up at his feet.

As we follow Scenic Drive, we catch glimpses of Lake Austin, one of the seven dam-made lakes on the lower Colorado River, which runs right through the center of the city. Oaks, pecan trees, and cedars cover the landscape, and I spot only a couple of cacti the whole time. “Not what most people expect when they think of Texas,” says Bagby, of the Rotary Club of Austin.

I’m now turned around completely, thinking we are miles and miles out, close to the woodlands, when suddenly we emerge back onto the city grid. We’re not far north of the University of Texas, part of what keeps the Austin blood young and rushing.

This place is definitely a city on the grow. Famous for its rambunctious live music scene, Austin has seen whole neighborhoods transformed in recent years. Downtown, construction cranes clutter the skyline.

Yet what’s remarkable about Austin is its tranquility. It has many of those quiet places that seem so far from the urban center but are only a few minutes past a couple of curves off the main thoroughfares.

Bagby drives me along South Congress, the southern end of Austin’s main drag. Once a haven for prostitutes and drug dealers, the area is now lined with popular restaurants and bars, eclectic shops and boutiques. Hill Cafe – “one of the best for chicken-fried steak,” says Bagby – is one of them. The Broken Spoke, possibly the most authentic honky-tonk you’ll ever find, is another. Each night, it packs in country music fans for a hearty meal and some serious dancing.

A commercial real estate specialist, Bagby seems to know the square footage of just about every site we visit. “For now, it’s a massive rush to build condos,” he says. Take Block 21, the $250 million mixed-use development that’s set to open in 2010. The complex will include condos and a W Hotel, along with a children’s museum and new studios for the eclectic PBS live concert series Austin City Limits.

Still, Bagby says, “Austin’s all about ‘green’ stuff.” The city, which strives to minimize the environmental impact of its development, is aiming to obtain 20 percent of its energy from efficient and renewable sources by 2020. It plans to accomplish this goal with help from a particularly conscientious population; Bagby himself gets about one-third of his electricity from a modest solar array on his roof. In fact, Austin is near the top of the environmental green list and truly lives up to the label: 220 parks adorn the city.

Park it

The next day, another Austin club member, Ladd Pattillo, shows me a few of these green spots, starting with the local swimming hole at the 360-acre Zilker Metropolitan Park. The spring-fed waters offer relief from the Texas heat, and patrons can rent kayaks and canoes for a gentle paddle out to Town Lake (recently renamed Lady Bird Lake for the late U.S. first lady, who did much to beautify Austin). Next we stop at the Umlauf Sculpture Garden, where over 130 sculptures are set amid ponds and waterfalls in a park bursting with greenery.

After walking the grounds there, Pattillo and I tour the Texas State Cemetery, where famous Texans such as legendary settler Stephen Austin, former U.S. Representative Barbara Jordan, and Dallas Cowboys football coach Tom Landry were laid to rest, as well as many veterans of battles dating back to the 1830s and the Texas Revolution.

Like the state of Texas, the Rotary Club of Austin is huge – more than 300 members – so I’m able to meet yet another Rotarian guide, Mary Reynolds. Chartered back in 1913, her club tackles polio, tuberculosis, and illiteracy. One of its largest projects is Camp Enterprise, a weekend retreat where high school students learn about ethics and business.

Reynolds takes me to the Austin Museum of Art – not the one downtown, but the smaller Laguna Gloria location, overlooking Lake Austin. “No one knows to come here,” she says. Those who do know stroll along the lakeshore amidst oaks, roses, and sculpture gardens. You can also tour a restored 1916 villa, formerly the home of Clara Driscoll, a philanthropist and preservationist who played a key role in preventing the Alamo from being torn down in the early 1900s.

“Every neighborhood has some kind of park,” Reynolds informs me, and I quickly learn that every Austinite has some kind of secret place to recommend. She takes me next door to Mayfield Park, where more peacocks than visitors are promenading about the grounds.

Wing it

One not-so-secret attraction is found where nature and urban development meet. Somehow, the largest urban colony of bats in North America has discovered and moved into the perfectly bat-friendly gaps in the understructure of the Congress Avenue Bridge. At 1.5 million, the bats equal the human population of the Austin metro area. Crowds gather at dusk to watch them fly out en masse in search of food.

They’re not the only ones happy to go out for a meal. As Bagby puts it, “Creativity with cuisine is at a high demand here.” One evening, at Shady Grove restaurant, I order a tortilla-crusted catfish fillet with queso and pico de gallo and a twice-baked potato infused with pickled jalapeños. I sit in a courtyard under an enormous pecan tree, listening to free live music. While I dine, Austin club president Tim Von Dohlen enters with his family. I’ve barely been in Austin three days, and already it feels like a small town.

On my last day, I’m back downtown with Bagby, circling the magnificent Texas Capitol, which is 14 feet taller than the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C. Its locally quarried sunset-red granite glows in the late afternoon. We stop for a photo at one of the giant Gibson guitars decorated by various artists and planted on street corners around the city, a tribute to a town with nearly 700 concert venues.

We round a corner, and Bagby remembers yet another Austin must-see: “Esther’s Follies! You have to go! It’s the Saturday Night Live of Austin.” He advises going to the late show on Friday, when the actors are pretty sure there are no kids in the audience.

I end my trip with Bagby and his wife, Leslie, at the Oasis, a restaurant perched on a cliff high above the 65-mile-long Lake Travis, his favorite place to see the sunset. He orders some nachos and a margarita swirl. Though we’re early, a good-sized crowd is already gathering. It’s a perfect spot to appreciate the pulse of a happening city – and the calm of nature.

Rotary in Austin

Chartered in 1913, the Rotary Club of Austin meets Tuesdays at 11:30 a.m. at St. David’s Episcopal Church. The club has more than 300 members.