Going to San Antonio!

Heh.. We hit this place over Memorial Day weekend. It was okay, but the most memorable part was the freaky scary birds that came after us! I admit, we were feeding them from the window which you are NOT supposed to do but everyone does anyway but have you ever SEEN a bird bigger than your car stick its long snaky neck into your window with its pointy beak and demand food! I found a squeal trigger. I did NOT deal well.

Here’s the deal. Keep the windows closed if you’re gonna freak out. It’s really a safari park. The object of the game is that you drive through the park in your car. The critters can’t get in, and you can’t get out. It works.

We did get some excellent pictures..

These guys cracked me up. If you know what they are drop me a comment. I just called them goats for fun. Whatever they are, they would just stand there and stare at you. Reeallly. Side by side..staring. There was another one (same goat, he just changed his horns on the way over ) who came to talk to me at my window..this picture was taken as we drove away. I suppose he was checking his nose in the reflection on my paint.

He was pretty cute and fun. Did you know the tongues on these critters fit up their noses PERFECTLY? The angle the tongue comes out of their mouth is perfect for the angle of the slit of their nostril. I was horrified. Gag/laugh the whole time. So THAT’S how animals take care of that!

Okay, enough with the gross jokes-let’s get down to business.

Their website is located here. Admission is currently $15.50 per adult, $7.50 for children 3-11, and Senior citizens (65+) get in for $14.50. Summer hours are 9am to 6.30 Memorial day through Labor day, 9am to 5pm the rest of the year. From I-35, the ranch is very easy to find. Just follow the signs to Natural Bridge Caverns, there’s no way they’ll let you overlook the place.

I love touring the city at night. There are far fewer people and the intimacy with the city is much greater. The Governor’s Palace is something that I would recommend visiting both during the day and at night, however.

There’s just not much to see at night. However it’s still a fun place to spend 15 minutes or so. The plaza is quiet and dark, with crepe myrtles drifting in the constant San Antonio breeze.

When you go visit, take a look at the keystone and the door. One of the cool things about this era of Spanish architecture is the keystones or doors all seem to tell a story.

From the San Antonio City website:

An old timer who says his father related the story to him, tells a story of the history of Spanish America as written in the symbols carved on the front door of the Spanish Governor’s Palace . . . (Reading from the top right side of the door down):

The sea shells represent la Nina, la Pinta, and la Santa Maria as they voyaged from the mother country over the sea. The dragons represent the dangers encountered by the first settlers and the baby face represents the new country, America. The settlers brought with them their arms for protection and they came into the great land of flowers and plenty (resources, gold, silver) where they found the Indian. (Continuing on the left hand door reading from the bottom up). The medallion showing the head of the Spanish Conquistador represents the Spaniards who came into this land of flowers and plenty (flower symbols) and by reason of their arms (the shields) conquered all the dangers (the dragons) including the Indians (mask of Indian Medicine Man) and so these first settlers won this land for the mother country across the sea.

It was built in 1722 and is described by National Geographic Society as the most beautiful building in San Antonio.

The Palace is available for tours Monday through Saturday 9am to 5pm and Sundays from 10am to 5pm. Admission for adults is just $1.50 and 75 cents for children 7-13. The littlest ones get in free.

It’s really easy to find, it’s served by the yellow and purple street car lines. To drive, just take either Commerce or Market Streets. The official address is 105 Plaza de Armas. That plaza is located between the two parallel streets.

This is a statue of a conquistador and was presented to San Antonio by Spain in 1977. You’ll find it right in front of the Governor’s Palace.

It strikes me as bizarre..the conquistadors were both such a positive and negative depending on the point of view. Just odd that Spain would think the citizens of San Antonio would want to be reminded of smallpox and massacre.

Addition:

We did go see it yesterday..wow. There are lots of incredible artifacts on display. Texas museums and parks amaze me. Everything is so *accessible*. There is a chair on display at the Governor’s Palace that is older than this COUNTRY. It’s sitting right beside a doorway with nothing but a rope draped across the seat to protect it. It’s absolutely beautiful and absolutely accessible. Amazing. I suppose Texas trusts her tourists to respect history.

This is a hugemongous festival and I can’t wait to go! It’ll be full of food, music, and dancing, three things that Chris and I love.

I don’t normally lazy out on posts too much but the festival website is so fantastic that I’m going to just direct you to links rather than make you read my reshash.

History of the festival is found here.

What you’ll find to do is here. The list of entertainers can be found here. This is a PDF file, so don’t cuss me if it bogs down your computer.

How to get to the festival and where to stay can be found here. Make your hotel reservations now! There’s a lot of rooms in San Antonio but summer season is upon us.

The tickets are really reasonably priced for what the festival is. Advance purchase tickets are $8, with day of tickets at $10 apiece. You can buy a full weekend pass for $25, but it’s only available online. There are several locations and ways to buy tickets. The link to that information is here.

Eric of Walkable Neighborhoods was kind enough to host this weeks carnival.

If you’re not a carnival participant go become one!  Check out this weeks selection of city blogs from around the world!

I don’t plan to make a habit of writing snarky posts on here, but I just saw an ad in the San Antonio Current that put the nail in the coffin for Yokonyu Sushi.

We went to Yokonyu last week or the week before, I can’t remember. Chris and I both love sushi though we don’t know much about it, and it’s definitely an extravagant treat for us right now.

We chose Yokonyu because we were downtown and it was the first sushi restaurant we came to. Oh man, what a poor choice. We were seated at this extra small table and whoever chose these tables for the restaurant just wasn’t thinking. As a ‘ready table’ it had two plates with folded napkins and two sets of chopsticks and rests. That makes sense, but what made the table misery was the dish of sweeteners off to the side. The table was just too small! Really too small. I’m not just being fussy.

Sushi has lots of condiments and plates and dishes and a tiny table just isn’t comfortable. I ended up piling the dish of sweeteners on the windowsill next to us and sent their TWO dishes of special condiments (in addition to the soy sauce) back to the kitchen because there just wasn’t room for those, our plates, and our food. To make the situation more aggravating, there is an incredibly busy pattern of what looks like coils of metal all over the tabletop. Hardly the vibe I want when eating sushi.

Maybe I chose badly from the menu, maybe I accidentally picked items that had large amounts of cream cheese in them, I dont’ know. All I know is that every damn thing we ordered tasted the same. We ordered three different rolls, and they all tasted like cream cheese!

Overall the visit was uncomfortable and disappointing. I was content to leave it be, however, until I saw the ad in the Current. Not only do they annoyingly advertise themselves as “Downtown’s Hippest Sushi Restaurant” but they also advertise a 10% discount for locals, no id necessary, excluding lunch specials.

What a crock of shit! What a self defeating and unethical policy!

I’m confident this is a common policy with businesses in the city and they’re just foolish enough to advertise it, but have some sense here. This is a city of 1.7 million and 20 million people visit this city each year. Your bread and butter depends on these people.

Develop a habit and a reputation of fleecing tourists and pretty soon that income stream will dry up.

Even when I flip the idea and try to see the lower prices as a lure to get folks to come downtown it’s still a bad idea. It still looks like fleecing tourists and I’m still not happy about it.