San Antonio

We took a day trip to San Antonio last week. On the way down we picked up barbecue from Texas Pride (a place recommended on Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives). We got our food "to go" and headed to Mission San Jose for a picnic.

Mission San Jose still has most of its original buildings and has retained an authentic apperance. We watched a brief film that explained why people came to the missions (there are several in San Antonio) and then toured the grounds on our own.

The church (pictured above) was the center of the mission. The walls that made up the courtyard square held over 80 individual rooms. We think each family had two rooms. They were tiny!

After visiting Mission San Jose, we went to the Alamo. Only the long barracks and the church remain of the original Alamo structure. I was glad we had already seen Mission San Jose so that we had a good idea of how a mission was structured and what the Alamo probably looked like.

Our next stop was the famous River Walk where shops and restaurants line the San Antonio River. The children thought it was pretty. Some said it was their favorite part of the day. The fact that we stopped to cool off at the Rainforest Cafe with drinks and dessert didn't hurt their opinion. :-)

Our final destination was the Japanese Tea Garden. Visiting it was a nice relaxing way to end our day.

Although it was very hot, we enjoyed our day in San Antonio. The best part...everything we did was free! We only paid for gas and food. I told Brian it was nice to know there are still things you can do that don't cost any money.