Texas 2013 - San Antonio

When we were in Texas last week we took a day trip to San Antonio. We didn't get to spend as much time there as I would have liked, but I fell in love with what I saw. I would move to San Antonio in a heartbeat, given the chance.

We started out downtown at the Riverwalk. What a beautiful area!

The old buildings, the huge trees, flowers everywhere...just amazing. Every restaurant has an outdoor patio with wrought iron furniture and brightly coloured umbrellas. It was hard to take it all in.

We walked around a bit and then had lunch at a mexican restaurant. The lady sitting next to us befriended this duck and was sneaking it tortilla chips. I swear it was going to crawl up in her lap, it was so friendly.

After lunch, Tom had to meet a friend so we headed north of downtown. While he talked to his friend I sat in the car and looked up real estate listings, pretending I was moving there.

We really wanted to see the missions before it got dark but we didn't have time to see them all, so we chose Mission Espada for the aquaduct, Mission San José for the church, and the Alamo because, well, you have to see the Alamo, right? As Canadians, southern US history is just a story for us, but we wanted to learn as much as we could.

We were the only ones at Mission Espada. It was so quiet, we felt like we should tiptoe around.

The chapel is so lovely, and the nuns who live on the grounds keep the courtyard outside their quarters full of flowers and trees.

We took a quick trip to the aquaduct but the area was closing so I didn't get any good pictures. The irrigation system is made up of gravity-flow ditches, dams, and an aquaduct to distribute water to 3,500 acres of land.

We then moved on to Mission San José. Luckily, it is open a half hour longer than Espada. San José is much bigger, and has had more restoration work done.

There is a water-powered mill on the grounds, believed to be the oldest mill in Texas. We were lucky enough to see it working just before they shut the water gate for the day.

We heard that the Alamo was open for another half hour (did we plan our path well or what?) so we hurried back to downtown. We only had about 10 minutes so we didn't get to see very much. In fact, Tom didn't even get to go inside the mission. He dropped me off so I could take pictures and went to find a parking spot. There were so many people around that it was hard to get unobstructed shots.

I didn't get a chance to explore, so I had to settle for taking pictures of the plaques and reading them later.

(click photo to enlarge)

We wandered back along the Riverwalk and headed over to the King William historic district. It turned out to be quite a hike for two people who hadn't eaten since noon. This neighbourhood used to be part of the Alamo land, was sold off, became a fashionable area for German immigrants, fell out of favour, and has since been restored. It is quite a large area, but since my stomach was rumbling we only wandered a few of the streets.

The houses on those streets though! Huge mansions on even larger properties. Some of the houses have walking tours throughout the day.

Even the garages/carriage houses are worth a second look.

I also took pictures of a couple of the outdoor patios. We don't have outdoor areas you can use year-round in Ontario, so to see them is always a novelty.

This one was on the second floor, linking the main house to the guest house.

We headed back to the Riverwalk again and stopped for BBQ. I ordered beef ribs - wow they are huge! There were tons of fish in the river, begging for bread scraps. This one came up to say hello. He looks a bit grumpy, doesn't he? Maybe because the bread was so good I wouldn't share.

I had heard about a mexican bakery that was open 24 hours, so I dragged Tom around the streets looking for it. I knew approximately where it was, but we still ended up walking a couple of miles and found it almost by accident.

The area was still really busy, even for being nearly 10 o'clock at night. We were pretty beat by then, and we still had a long drive back to Houston, so we started the trek back to the car. We ended up walking past the Alamo again so I got another shot of the chapel, this time all lit up.

We had such a great time that we are determined to come back, for longer next time. I want to stay in this hotel with a room overlooking the water.

Do you live in San Antonio? Do you go downtown very often? I'm guessing the locals avoid the crowds, but I don't know if I'd be able to tear myself away.