San Antonio

After the short drive from Austin, we spent the day walking around San Antonio.  What a wonderful city for a tourist.

We stopped at the Tower Life Building and learned a great deal about the buildings use and history from the lobby security guard.  Who would have thought that it had been built originally as a 6–story Sears Roebuck store.  The tower was added later to bring the number of floors to 31.  On entering the original part of the building one is met with an incredible arch decorated with much “gingerbread” and gold.  It’s worth the visit.

Also worth the visit were the craft galleries in La Villita.  The old village building here have been restored and contain fiber, pottery, and glass studios.  Unfortunately not all were open on a Monday.

Our 3.5 mile walk along the Riverwalk ,which included a visit to the Alamo, was a delight.  The plantings and stone work are outstanding. Many people chose to take a guided barge trip along the canal and river, but we walked though we did listen carefully to the narrative whenever one of the guides was speaking near us.  After a lunch at the RiverWalk Center we walked over to the Alamo.  It’s been well-preserved and is clearly a very important part of their history to Texans.

The temperature was falling and the sun was hiding so we headed back to the van and headed west.  We are heading to Big Bend National Park, but stopped for the night in Del Rio, TX.

-- Janet (text) and David (photos)