Posted August 3, 200618 yr I wasn't at all looking forward to visiting San Antonio, I was thinking hot, touristy, and southern. But the city blew me away. The city is alive and largely intact, with handfuls of architectural gems. The historic Riverwalk is a simply amazing, but don't fall in, its a $500 fine plus you must come back for a court date. We ate at about 9 or 10 of the restaurants along the Riverwalk. While they were good, not one provided "good" service, there is just too big a demand. BTW, San Antonio has a $2B tourist industry, attracting nearly 11M visitors a year. Alamodome Marriott Riverwalk View from hotel room Rivercenter Mall ' The Menger (sp?) Hotel They still make RC? Dillards I remembered BEAUTY This building is actually new This grows on you...really The Market (can't remember the name) is a cool little place with little cheap shops of hispanic goods Marriott Rivercenter...where we stayed, a nice, but plain facility From the Hyatt roof pool deck v The future...
August 3, 200618 yr Nice! "You don't just walk into a bar and mix it up by calling a girl fat" - buildingcincinnati speaking about new forumers
August 3, 200618 yr ^Yep, there was almost always a steady stream of people within the main loop between the flood channel and along the Rivercenter extention.
August 3, 200618 yr nice work. i heart sa. we usually stay up in austin, but go to sa almost every year. the downtown is a lot bigger and has a lot more stunning old buildings than you might think. ink did you get to the st. mary's area just below the riverwalk and la villita? it's the hip area of town. did ya do the mission tour? thats fun. i picked up bad lasting habit of pouring salt into my beer from the mexican guys down there, heh! i'm looking forward to pt 2. ps -- for you guys that pick on columbus for its gerrymandering and annexing ways, they are not the only ones -- take a look at this san antonio info: According to the 2000 U.S. Census, the city had a population of 1,144,646 [3], ranking it the ninth-most populated city in the country. Due to San Antonio's lack of significant population surrounding the city limit, the metropolitan area ranked 30th in the U.S. with a population of 1,592,383.
August 3, 200618 yr ^I don't think I made it to St. Mary's, but I did do the missions tour, which will make up part 2.
August 3, 200618 yr The riverwalk areas looked very impressive, as well as, some other pockets (buildings) here or there. But overall I was not find SA all that 'stunning'.....just my opinion :|
August 4, 200618 yr That string of missions south of downtown is pretty good...architecturally they are better than the Alamo. There are some neat neighborhoods north and just south of downtown. The area south of La Villeta that I recall was called "King William"...a lot of great old victoriana down there. Some interesting areas north of downtown too. Ink, glad to see you made it to the area around the plaza and market, west end of downtown. Thats an interesting little area (I think that was the orginal Spanish plat) and there is an old house from the Mexican era over near the plaza. I took a tour of it when i was in SA.
August 4, 200618 yr Those shots look great!!! I loved the Alamo Dome when i was in San Antonio...musch better than the RCA dome in indy...pretty good accoustics for a dome........Also, With a tourist industry of 11 Million people a year...there must be some pretty cool stuff in S.A.
August 4, 200618 yr Nice pics. I love that canal thing..looks great. I didn't know they had anything like that.
August 4, 200618 yr jeff the king william historic nabe is the west side of st. marys, def worth a visit. i was thinking of the east of st. marys, which i think is kind of like the hip 'tremont' nabe of sa. my fav mex restaurant, el mirador, is around there. puffy tacos, soups and all around stellar mex food. i love that joint, ah now i am making myself hungry! :laugh: another up and coming nabe not mentioned around downtown is around sunset station, the beautiful old rail station by the alamodome & just east of the riverwalk. there is some rehab/building stuff going on around there. it's kind of like sa's 'gateway' nabe. the old pearl brewery just to the south is yet another funky local icon worth a visit too. as for north, we have stayed a couple times in b&b's and went to a few restaurants on the north side of sa's downtown past the northside industrial warehouse-y area, it's called alamo heights, some nice homes & stuff, but eh. honestly i prefer to stay in austin and drive down to sa, it's more fun.
August 5, 200618 yr After spending 2 weeks in Houston (and with 1 more to go) :x I can appreciate San Antonio more now than I did on my two visits there.
August 6, 200618 yr Great pics, Inkaelin. I'm looking forward to going to San Antonio next summer. My wife went there in the late 90's and still talks all the time about how beautiful it was.
August 6, 200618 yr Riverwalk looked very nice. The rest of the city, especially the parts seen in the first half-dozen pics or so, looked like the usual uninspiring Sun Belt stuff. I like the pics of the Pizza Hut and McDonald's using the ground floor of existing buildings (are you reading this Walgreen's, Rite Aid and CVS?). Though it was hard to see the ground/streetscape in some pics, Ink. But very nice pics overall. "In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage." -- John Steinbeck
August 6, 200618 yr Very nice tour. The most I've seen of SA since I went through basic there in '66.
August 7, 200618 yr The riverwalk areas looked very impressive, as well as, some other pockets (buildings) here or there. But overall I was not find SA all that 'stunning'.....just my opinion :| I suspect, Uncle R., that you haven't been to other cities in Texas... no other city there comes close to SA in terms of character. Then again, I am a bit biased... I spent two great years there right out of high school, working in a classical record store and doing a stint as a announcer on KRTU, the radio station of Trinity University. Every day, in the summer, I read the same weather forecast... "The high today in San Antonio will be 95, with no rain expected until October." There were the NIOSA parties (Night in Old San Antonio) in the La Villita (old town) section during Feista week -- good times (the part of those nights I remembered the next morning); movies at the creepy (since restored) Aztec Theater downtown, great food in the bario in south SA... truly an amazing place. As the saying goes, "Texans envy Houston, they respect Dallas, but they love San Antonio."
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