On Christmas Eve day, we decided to explore the San Antonio Missions. We had already explored the Alamo. There are four in the area, at least two of which still had active parishes that we could see.
Although you could, in theory, walk between the missions, it would be a long boring walk. We drove between them as each one had a parking lot.
The buildings themselves were really neat to see. Each Mission was a little different and had their own interesting features. However, our favorite was the San Jose Mission with it’s large grounds.
We started at Mission Concepción. The grounds were open, but the buildings were closed.
Mission San Josè: There was a little library at the Visitor Center. This Mission seemed like it was the largest walled grounds of the ones we saw. Outside of the main walls was a mill. We were able to go inside the church and chapel area. We saw what looked like frescoes on one of the walls and an awesome spiral staircase that looked like it was made of wood!
Those two things don’t sound like they go together, do they? After looking online at RoadsideAmerica and Atlas Obscura, we decided to go back to the Brackenridge Park area.
There were buildings from what remains of a concrete plant. It ran from 1880-1908. The buildings were still there and you could see some equipment if you peer through the railings.
Behind the ruins lay what used to be the limestone quarry. The city turned the quarry into a Japanese Tea Garden. It was amazing. There were koi, bridges, and a waterfall. There was a cafe as well, although it was not open when we were there. I would love to have been able to sit there and read, it was beautiful and peaceful (minus the people).
After the garden was completed, there was a caretaker for many years. The city then asked Mr. Jingu and his family to live there and maintain it. They lived there even after Mr. Jingu’s death caring for the garden, until WWII when the family was kicked out of their home due to Japanese fear. The garden was renamed. It wasn’t until 1983, that the city restored the name. Can you imagine living there for generations and then being kicked out of your home?
It’s a gorgeous area with lots of history. I would definitely check it out if you are in San Antonio!
Although it is really nice for the weather to be between 60-70 degrees (F), it is a little weird that it is so warm the week of Christmas. Saturday we bought a ticket to go see illumiNight, a drive through Christmas light show. It was held at the AT&T Center. The tickets were for timed entry, although there was still quite a wait to get in. A ticket (per car) was $35 (plus online “processing” fees) and $63 for entry/Santa picture (physically distancing). It was cashless, so online ticket sales were recommended.
After entering the grounds, you kind of wrapped around the parking lot, weaving back and forth to make it seem like you were moving (but were still really just in line to get in to the main event). There was a light tunnel and a few other glowing decorations. There was a stop for bathrooms (portable kind) and drive through food. The food was similar to the Fair Foodie Fest we went to in California, although it wasn’t as well run. It was confusing as to whether you should get out of your car to order or not, as they didn’t come up to your window very quickly.
Passing the food and the bathrooms, you finally wrapped around again and came to the main entrance of the light show.
There were some awesome light displays. I loved the train, polar bear, and huge ornaments. There were some quirky things too, like statues of a coyote and antelopes. I’m not really sure on how those fit in.
There was a section for the 12 days of Christmas. It was a neat take on a Christmas light show, although we had a hard time remembering what all the items were. Number 3, we titled Paris Christmas Chickens.
As we were driving into San Antonio, we had passed a huge gas station called BUC-EE’S. We had never seen such an animal and made a note to come back to see it. We weren’t disappointed when we finally got there. Apparently it is a chain, mostly in Texas (eastern). We stopped at the Bastrop location.
Outside had a large store, with 3 fuel/Ethonel Free/DEF stations.
They are apparently known for their clean restrooms. These restrooms were huge, clean, and very nice. The boys reported even the men’s restroom was clean! I had a toilet cleaning dispenser and a hand sanitizer dispenser in my stall.
There were so many food and drink options you could find something for everyone. We ended up buying Beaver Friends (animal crackers), licorice, a slushy, and chopped and sliced brisket sandwiches with chips. The brisket sandwiches are made right there in the store.
This company did a great job with putting the Buc-ee mascot on pretty much everything (clothes, wine glasses, keychains, food items). We found a few Christmas gifts for people as well. The store also sold ice really cheap (10lb/$0.79, 20lb/$0.99), so we got a bag on our way out. We browsed around the shop for awhile and picked up a couple of items.
The parking lot was pretty large as well. If we see another one on our travels, I would definitely stop. It was quite the experience.
Austin was a little over an hour away from the campground and we were excited to see it. We had heard a lot of good things about the city, plus there were a few holiday events there that we wanted to check out.
We started off at the Blue Genie Art Bazaar. It was a really neat store with booths from different artists. Nick made out with a new baby Yoda face mask and a keychain guitar pick holder. I found a chocolate bar with locally sourced ingredients. It looks like it will be tasty. They did a great job with Covid precautions: everyone had to wear masks and they were limiting the amount of people allowed in the space.
We drove further into Austin and had a little bit of a hard time finding parking. There were several artist booths with items for sale ranging from food to jewelry and clothes. We found a couple of items for Christmas gifts. We wandered around and tried pizza from Home Slice and ice cream from Amy’s. We explored this amazing candy store called Big Top Candy Shop. The inside decor was awesome and they had all different types of candy (chocolates, gummies…).
We also saw the Austin Motel’s Winter Wanderland. This must be a fun place to stay. It was close enough to walk to shops and restaurants and had a really cool vibe. They decorated the courtyard (even the pool area!) for Christmas with a lot of trees and garland. Even the prickly pear cacti had ornaments on them! It was really neat to see, super festive.
I did notice as a whole, the part of Austin we were in did a much better job with wearing masks, even outside.
Although we certainly do not miss the Ohio winters, there is something about snow and lights that get you in the holiday spirit. There are not a lot of Christmas lights or decorations up at the campground yet, just our lights and two other RVs. It certainly doesn’t feel like Christmas time yet, even with our River Walk experience.
After searching online, we found a few Covid safe events. Our first event was a free one at a local church, a live drive through Nativity.
It was only held one weekend and had quite the line to get in. The church had its own app which had a music track. If you didn’t have the app, they also offered a CD for you to borrow for the car. They had their own radio station playing a live broadcast as well.
The story began with the three wise men and their three camels. These were the only animals we saw, the rest of the “live” was from the people. The town setting of Bethlehem was really neat (although I only saw 1 person wearing a mask in the scene). At the end there was even an actual baby for Jesus! The scenes, props, and costumes were quite elaborate.
We wanted to find a couple of Christmas things to do with the kids for their first Christmas away from home. While I hoped we didn’t see any snow, we did want to see some Christmas lights! After searching online, I found the 55 Nights of Fredericksburg Lights. The town did a nightly event to turn on the lights at the Marketplatz and featured the 26 ft tall German Christmas Pyramid.
The pyramid was made in Germany and was the tallest one in the US when it came over. It was neat to see; all but the top layer moved. The candles were electric (small Christmas pyramids for houses used to use real candles).
The town itself was very cute with lots of historic looking buildings. There were several hilarious shop signs as well.
It was about an hour drive from our campground. We went on a Tuesday, which may have been a mistake. Although the 55 Nights were advertised, there actually wasn’t a lot to do when we got there (about 4:45pm). It seemed like most of the shops were closed for the day (or there were several that were closed on Tuesdays and Wednesdays). There were only two places open serving dinner type of food (a wine tasting place and a brewery) and an ice cream shop. (We ended up grabbing dinner on the way home.) There was also a chocolate shop, but once we got to the front doors and saw the employees were not wearing masks, we did not go in.
I did find some cute mini cookie cutters and a Christmas gift for Will. We did not stay long after the lighting, as most places were closed.
We had been looking forward to seeing the San Antonio River Walk for a long time, years in fact. So, of course, one of our first stops in San Antonio was the River Walk.
After driving around to find parking (everything is paid parking, even street parking), we lucked out and found a spot near one of the River Walk bridge entrances.
The River Walk is as neat as everyone says. There were sections of just walking (or running for some people) with plants growing along the walls or decorations in the retaining/bridge walls. Then there was the shopping and restaurant section of the River Walk. The restaurants certainly had great patio views.
Our first trip there was during the day, which was great. But Ben had seen online that the Christmas lights really make it beautiful. So, we went back during a Luminary weekend, which was too pretty. We found a restaurant next to the river to eat dinner (Casa Rio). All the wait staff wore masks, and there were plastic curtains between tables. They also seated customers with a table in between them for spacing. The ducks that occupy the canal are expert beggars at these restaurants. The kids named them water pigeons. While eating it was fun to hear snippets of the boat tour guides speeches as they passed. Ultimately, we got to sit and and enjoy the lights as they came on at dusk.
The restaurants were decked out in lights, there were lights hanging down from the trees and they had luminaries placed along the sidewalk. It looked like open-drink carry was allowed, as we saw several people with (plastic) glasses of wine or even baggies with straws for frozen margaritas.
CAUTION: Most of the sidewalk does not have railings. Be careful while walking along the edge. It would be really easy to fall in. Luckily, we did not.
It was a really neat treat to see the River Walk and so far it has had my favorite Christmas decorations.
The Fort Worth Coliseum holds weekly rodeos on Friday and Saturday nights. They have competitors come in from all over (on the night we went they had one cowboy from Alaska and two from Brazil). They had timed events and rough stock events. (According to their website, Saturday nights have more rough stock events.) We learned that a rough stock event is normally bull and bronco riding, whereas a timed event is the roping and barrel racing.
It was our first ever rodeo and we weren’t sure what to expect. The Coliseum had a few different seating options: General Seating, Silver Spur (set of 5 reserved seats, in first two rows), Gold Buckle (reserved seats in the middle, cushioned seats with cup holders), VIP (3 rows with a bar). We were worried about taking the risk going to a rodeo during the pandemic and chose the Gold Buckle seats to ensure our greatest chance at social distancing. We were lucky enough to be sponsored for these seats from an award Ben had received from work. It turned out great! The chairs were very comfortable and gave us some distance from other people. We were also close to the action. So close we even had dirt flung up from the arena floor a couple times.
We saw bull riding, roping, barrel racing, bronco and bare back bronco riding. The strength and flexibility to do these events was remarkable. Even with the high skill of these athletes, one cowboy get knocked out and had to be carried off the field.
Due to COVID, the Coliseum limited seating to 75% and required masks to enter. The announcer was great about reminding people to socially distance and to wear masks throughout the event. However, there was no real enforcement. Once people were inside, it seemed like at least half of them took their masks off (not for eating/drinking, just off). We left ours on the whole time.
We delayed putting this blog out until we were sure we did not end up with COVID from the experience. Luckily we are all still healthy (i.e.-no-COVID fallout from the Rodeo). Yee haw!
We were worried about the animals. It was amazing to see these athletes demonstrate their craft, but it concerned us that the animals could be hurt for our entertainment. Specifically, we wanted to know what was being done to make the bulls and horses buck. I did some reading and discovered it is a combination of breeding and the use of a pressure inducing flank strap. Here are a couple of the articles on why bulls buck: Arlington, LiveAbout.
Overall, our first rodeo was a lot of fun and definitely a learning experience. I’m not sure that I would go out of my way to see another Rodeo, but I am very glad I had the opportunity to see it.
One of Will’s picks to see on this trip was the Alamo. This kid loves history.
It was in the downtown area, not far from the River Walk. We walked between the two quite easily (it was less than 10 minutes, depending on where you were on the River Walk).
It was really neat to see. They did a really nice job with historical information signs and diagrams. There’s a gorgeous, huge, oak tree in the courtyard. (Ben’s favorite thing was the “historical” gift shop.)
Due to Covid, there was a limited amount of people allowed in the church area of the Alamo. Tickets were free, but they were sold out the day we were there. We do plan on going back once we can get tickets.
VISITOR NOTE: The postcards in the Alamo gift shop were $1.99 each. The shop across the street and the San Antonio Visitor Center had them for about $0.35/each.
