Sep 2, 20223 min read

San Antonio, TX

Population: 1,529,000 Elevation: 650'

San Antonio, home of the Spurs, the Alamo, and the Riverwalk.

We only have a couple of good days to explore San Antonio. The rain is moving back in on Saturday.

The lady who checked us in asked me if I kept my bikes in the trailer or outside of the trailer. I said I kept them outside, on the bike rack. She then told me that bike theft is a problem in San Antonio. The park has a bike storage building with a keypad and cameras outside it. I put the bikes in there. Some people, though, are still trusting. Some of the bikes in there were not locked, just sitting in the rack. I still used locks on our bikes. If someone does break in, they will take the easy ones first.

There was a burst water pipe in the park at the end of the row where we are parked and that end of the row is blocked off. If the repairs are not done by the time we leave, we will have to pull out of the site, then back up past an intersection and then turn around at the intersection. During our morning dog walk, we checked out the repairs. They seem to be done and have put down new asphalt. Unless they dig up the asphalt again, we should be safe to leave next week.

We took a trip to downtown San Antonio on Thursday. We parked in the center of downtown and went down to the Riverwalk. It's really hard to miss the Riverwalk. It wanders all around the central downtown area. It is all lowered down from the buildings and streets so you have to walk down stairs to get to it. Here are some pictures from street level looking down at the Riverwalk.

We wandered up and down the Riverwalk for a short way. It was hot and very humid. Most of the Riverwalk is gardens, restaurants, bars, and hotels.

It was hot so we got on one of the tour boats. The San Antonio river is not very big so neither are the tour boats. They take you down all of the Riverwalk.

I'm not sure which hotel this was, but they must have had a good party. Those pants are pretty high up in the tree.

Here are some random facts that the tour guide told us.

San Antonio is the second oldest city in North America, after St. Augustine, FL.
Before it was a state, Texas was the Republic of Texas and neither dollars nor peso were accepted as money. The Texas money was called Redbacks.
When people came into the city, they were not allowed to bring their guns, but they were allowed to bring in their ammo. If they didn't have any Redbacks, they could pay for booze with bullets. One bullet bought 1oz of booze. They soon called these drinks "shots". That name has stuck.
The Alamo is not its real name. It is is really called The Mission San Antonio Valero. Since there were 5 missions in the city, they gave it the nickname of the Alamo because of all the cottonwood trees around it. Cottonwood is called Alamo in Spanish.
All the downtown streets are laid out and named exactly as they were when the city was founded. They only added 3 new streets in 200 years.
What we call Mexican food is not what Mexicans call Mexican food. When Texas was owned by Mexico, they brought in German and Polish people to ranch and farm. This added wheat and sausage to the Mexican diet. When they started building railroads, they brought in Chinese people and that added rice to the Mexican diet. So if you go to a Mexican restaurant and order Chorizo, a burrito, and some beans and rice, the only real Mexican food on that plate is the beans.

Next, we walked to the Alamo. There is not really much left of the old mission.