Adventure in San Antonio, Texas
This will undoubtedly be a long post, be warned. Seeing the Alamo was a bucket list item for us. We are not great history buffs, so we knew little more about the Alamo than we had seen in the old western movies. We found an RV Park inside the outer loop of the city so we wouldn't be too far away from the sights we expected to see downtown. We later were told, by what we thought was a reliable source, that San Antonio is not only one of the largest cities in Texas, (second largest behind Houston!) but it is also the seventh largest city in the US! We had no idea what we were getting into.
The park we found was named the Admiralty. It had a military theme and was a very clean, orderly and relatively peaceful park given that they also had military efficiency of packing in the campers like sardines. You can see many rigs behind the flag court.
We decided to take a bus tour of the city. We chose the 9 hour tour called the Grand Tour. It was grand indeed. We got the most experienced tour guide David who was super knowledgeable about San Antonio history which included pretty much everything about the city from BC to present. He provided an outstanding narrative continuously from the time he picked us up at the flag court until he returned us there. It was amazing how he continued to drive that 47 passenger bus in heavy city traffic and some very tight situations, and he continued the tour narrative uninterrupted!
This is Gari reboarding after one of our stops you can see Dave at the wheel.
This is another shot of Dave providing information at one of the Missions on the tour. Dave was even part of the tour himself. His ancestors were Spanish and came over to live in a San Antonio mission. They were moved into Mexico by the terrible conflicts with Santa Ana there. Dave's family later returned to San Antonio where Dave has lived his entire life.
The first stop before 9:00 AM was the Alamo. There is the famous facade of the sanctuary which is so familiar. It is a National Landmark proteced by the Texas Rangers (see lower left of picture below) and no photographs are permitted inside the sanctuary. The battle at the Alamo lasted for 13 days. The alcalde of San Antonio reported cremating 182 bodies. (Others report numbers as high as about 250.) Although Santa Anna's report of killing 600 Texans can be dismissed. Santa Anna may have based his number on an intercepted letter that detailed the reinforcements that might be diverted to the Alamo. The numbers reportedly added up to about 600. As for Mexican casualties, Santa Anna reported losing 70 men. No wonder photos are not permitted inside. This is a sacred and tragic place in US and Texas history.
The Alamo was a Spanish Mission. This was the Spanish approach to colonizing their land holding of Tejas (today Texas). Tejas was much larger than the Texas of today and included parts of New Mexico, Oklahoma, Colorado and Kansas. The friars and franciscans sent from Spain worked to convert the many native american tribes in this area to Christianity. Many of the native american's were not interested and therefore, the missions needed protection. Many missions were set up as forts with the soldiers living right there among the Padres. Due to many difficult circumstances these missions were moved to different places more than once. The Alamo had previous locations as well. Alamo means Cottonwood trees, of which there are none anywhere near this final site we know as the Alamo.
The Alamo was an approximate 4 acre fort and a model is seen below. The lines running through and behind the Alamo are irrigation ditches from the San Antonio river which is only a couple of city blocks away. Pretty nice place; a clean water suply, protection, nice church. Very clever our ancestors they were.
The Memorial to those that gave their lives at the Alamo is seen below. The other part of the story about the Alamo... Mexico and Tejas were under Spanish control back at that time. Then Mexico gained its' independence from Spain, which left Tejas as part of Mexico. But the Texicans didn't see eye to eye with the brutal dictator Santa Ana and decided to break free from Mexico. It was only days after the formal independence of Texas was signed that the siege at the Alamo took place. Mexico and Santa Ana of course did not recognize the Texas independence. In the end and only a short time later General Sam Houston caught up to Santa Ana. Houston's force surprised and slaughtered the Mexican army near Houston during a siesta break in a mere 18 minutes. This is when Texas became its' own country. I had forgotten so much of that story, but seeing it all brought all the puzzle pieces back and made it alive for us.
Some of the famous names from the Alamo are General Travis and Davey Crockett. Crockett was a Senator from Ohio at that time.
A moving memorial.
Other scenes from around and of what is left of the Alamo (and where photography is permitted) A Texas Ranger stands guard at the Alamo.... a gorgeous old Oak tree behind.
The sanctuary doors at the Alamo. This is where we eventually entered for the inside tour.
Closer up.
One of the walls along the Alamo Mission.
An old name carved into the limestone and plaster. We saw several more of these carvings inside the sanctuary, some with dates back in the early 1800's.
The real name of the mission, San Antonio De Valero. A true cradle of Texas liberty.
The post office and courthouse building now surrounding the Alamo property. San Antonio seems to retain a smaller town charm due to the fact that they have been very careful not to tear down the old structures there.
Onto the Mission San José.
A model map of the mission. The pictures of the gate and flanking tower farther down in the blog are the right lower corner of this model. The larger building at the top is the sanctuary. The women lived in little "apartments" built into the walls all the way around the compound. The boys slept in the courtyard area where fig and pomegranate trees were growing and bearing the "fruits of fertility".
The front gate of San José, notice the little hole in the wall at the left of the door?
A flanking tower near the main gate, see the larger hole at the bottom? That is where the cannon balls emerge! These cannon holes go all the way around the tower. Ther are smaller gun holes above, just like near the gate.
Closer up at the main gate you can now clearly see the gun holes at the left of frame.
Close up of a gun hole at the main gate.
Standing at the main gate, look at that! A cannon hole pointing right at us from the flanking tower. A pretty good protection plan I'd say! It was very powerful to see this type of fortification. This was not so long ago... only about 150 years, not so long. I hope we never have to go back to this way of living. I suppose humans would adjust, but it just seems horrible to have to be so scared all the time.
This is one of the doors (on the inside of the walls) to get into the rooms within the walls where the guards armed their guns at the holes in the wall.
A view inside the flanking tower. Cannon hole below and a wooden scaffold for gun shooters above.
A view from inside an apartment looking out at Gari standing within the courtyard. Thick walls eh?
Steve standing in a door way in one of the apartments. A kiva fireplace left of frame behind Steve. The door frames were only about 6 ft tall .
A shot of the sanctuary from across the compound. You can see the famous Rose Window at the center bottom. It is an ornate window where the Padre would appear and deliver the Eucharist on Easter Sundays.
There it is closer up.
A view behind the sanctuary.
And that is the...
Next stop...
A big story here was the "frescos" Waterbased paintings done on the fresh plaster still visible today. There wasn't much left of them, so no decent pictures. Nevertheless an impressive old sanctuary inside and out.
Next stop the Market Place! Andale andale, arriba arriba! (Hurry up! Come on! Let's go!)
A painting for Captain Snap at the market place.
Steve and the one eared donkey named Hee-Huh?
A colorful mural at the market place.
Did someone say Margarita?
This shopkeeper arranges the colorful guitars.
Along the beautiful Riverwalk in downtown San Antonio.
We even got a 2.5 mile boat ride all through the Riverwalk area, it is really a beautiful city area.
We saw Jesus come by as part of a local Passion play as we near Easter.
Along the boat ride way.
Lots of attractive bridges.
Five bells representing the five missions in San Antonio seen along the boat ride route.
From the city streets, a large modern sculpture, and at the right, the Tower of the Americas built for the 1968 Worlds Fair and the only structure in San Antonio left from that Fair.
Last stop! The Buckhorn Saloon and Museum.
The Buckhorn Museum has 40,000 ft of exhibition space. The amount of exhibts they have in there is truly amazing and indeed Texas sized!
There were museums within the museum! This was a large exhibit on the Texas Rangers, very cool. Of course Bonnie & Clyde and associated memorabilia were a part of that collection.
There were more animal mounts in one place that we have ever seen. They had every species that you ever heard of including fish, but not so much birds, just a few magnificient specimens such as a huge eagle.
Main dining hall zoomed out a bit.
Outside the buckhorn
Steve under Magnum a magnificient Longhorn mount.
A few African mounts.
Gari beside a collection of what we believe were Waterbuffalo horns... and that's no bull!
We left San Antonio aiming at a week in Austin, but we were unsuccessful in finding a suitable parking spot there, so we ended up going on to Houston a week earlier than planned. We have the idea of purchasing a couple kayaks in Houston and arranging them to mount on the cab roof of the truck, so that will be a project in Houston. We will just spend our planned Austin week in Houston and make it two weeks there.
