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Published: April 21st 2010
1:San Antonio
After Leaving Austin (which I must add was not the best dog town we've seen) we moved just a bit west to the great little town of San Antonio. This was another splurge and we got a hotel. We thought it would give us a nice stable base in order to see the city while being able to leave Joy in the room for a few hours if we wanted to see a museum. It also so happenend to be a festival weekend. They call it "Fiesta" for some reason, unfortunately we continued our stretch of bad luck and the weather was crap so much of the first and biggest days was cancelled. There was to be parades and bands along with tons of local food for sale. In fact, it occurred to me that this must be what we came to when I was in high school band. I've visited SA once before. We were fortunate enough to visit TWO "Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives" places. The first was The Cove. This was started as a carwash that began to serve sandwiches. Now it's a great burger places with locally produced, organic ingredients. We had the lamb burger which
was featured on the show, but I have to admit it wasn't great. We did meet this very nice couple at the table sitting across from us. They had lived in SA for 30 years and the gentleman was from Wisconsin, so we had an obvious In. The second was a plcce called Tip Top Cafe....now this was a true diner/dive. they had a great pot roast but again, nothing spectacular. I'm beginning to think the restaurants up their game for the show.
Our Second day we got to walk around some of the ongoing Fiesta event and it was as advertised; lots of music and food. We also went to the Institute of Texan Cultures. They had exhibits about all of the different Native American tribes and then the European emmigrants who have populated the region. It was interesting but we felt it was kind of geared more toward highschool kids but certainly worth a stop in if you are ever in the city. We also made the obligatory visit to the Alamo...a must for everyone at some point. It's a quick visit but so much fun to feel steeped in the history of the place
My
final thought about this is that San Antonio is a very cool town. Most people talk about how much they like Austin, but I was much more impressed with SA. It is a laid back place with good food, nice music, and a fun atmosphere. I highly recommend checking it out
2: El Paso
This will be quick. It's an intriguing place to go. It has a very strange feel. Apparently the population is 80% hispanic so the culture is very different from other locations. The topography is gorgeous and you can look across the river to Ciudad Juarez....yes, that Juarez. it casts a sort of ominous shadow over everything else. It is also troubling to recognize the juxtoposition of a place that has had 5000 murders in three years against that of family friendly, college town of El Paso separated by only a river.
We then pushed on into Mew Mexico but at this point we were beginning to feel behind so we spent the night in a little town called Deming....very shady place but the ole' motor home (AKA the van) served us well and we moved on into Arizona the next day.
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