Is this really Texas? Why yes it is!
June 24th, 2008 by Zofia
On our third day in Austin we decided to go for a one and a half hour drive south to San Antonio, Texas (the second largest city in Texas). Mum and Lynsey had wanted to do this trip on their last visit to Austin but had run out of time and I had been recommended a visit to San Antonio and its famous River Walk by the nice lady I met in Denver, so we were looking forward to what San Antonio had to offer us.
Our first stop in San Antonio was the McNay museum – the first museum of modern art in Texas! The first thing you see when you pull up the driveway is this amazing Spanish-style villa and the only thing that gives this away as being a home of modern art is the array of very contemporary sculpture on the front lawn!
Inside the museum we were treated to works by Monet, Renoir, Gauguin, Cezanne, van Gogh, Cassatt, Degas, Picasso, Chagall, Calder, Diego Rivera, Robert Indiana, Cy Twombly, Jasper Johns, and Edward Hopper to name just a few artists represented in the collection. There was a room dedicated entirely to prints, and an entirely new wing attached to the Spanish-style building which contained contemporary painting and sculpture and opened out onto a sculpture garden as well. It was a magnificent museum and we ended up spending a good few hours there and didn’t even manage to see everything!
Time passed very quickly and suddenly it was nearly 1pm and all we had seen of San Antonio was the museum!! So off we went towards another icon of San Antonio, The Alamo. It was scorching hot outside the Alamo so we didn’t stay there very long, just long enough to get the general feel for the place and snap a few pictures. For those who don’t know, the Alamo was the site of a battle fought in February and March 1836. According to Wikipedia, the battle was part of the Texas Revolution and was the first step in Mexican President Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna’s attempt to retake the province of Texas after an insurgent army of Texan settlers and adventurers from the US had driven out all the Mexican troops a year earlier. The locals lost the battle and it is believed that of those who fought in the battle only two managed to survive. One of those that died was the famous frontiersman Davy Crockett.
By the time we had finished with the Alamo we were desperate to get to the River Walk and find a place in the shade (preferably with fans or air conditioning) to eat some lunch. We found a starting point and then started walking – it was amazing. Who knew that such a tropical looking paradise would exist in the middle of such a big city! Flowing right through the heart of San Antonio, the river winds its way around the city, below street level. The buildings seem to be built around the river and the trees rather than on top of them and there are wide walkways on either side of the river with the occasional bridge should you want to be on the other side. Once you were down there by the river it was easy to forget that you were in Texas because it really looked so different from everything else we had seen so far. We met up with some friends along the way who joined us for lunch. We found a nice little Mexican place and sat outside but under cover and enjoyed the food and each other’s company.
After lunch we continued to explore the River Walk. There are these river boat cruises you can do which give you a historical tour of San Antonio from the river, we contemplated taking one of these boat rides but in the end we decided to leave that for another visit in the hopefully not-so-distant future. 
There was this cute little theatre along the river as well. The stage was on one side of the river and the seating on the other side. An entrance to the area of town known as La Villita was just behind the theatre seating as well. Apparently the stage gets used regularly for local Mexican plays and Mexican style entertainment. It would be fun to come back here in the evening and experience the theatre in action.
Eventually we said goodbye to our local friends and headed back towards the car to make our way back to Austin. It was a gorgeous day spent in a gorgeous city… I hope I will return there someday.
