The International Cessna^® 170 Association

Hi All,

I've got most of the day stuck in a hotel in San Antonio this Thursday, July 26. I land my work plane at 10am... so by the time I get to the hotel it will be around 10:30ish.

Anybody in the area want to get together for lunch? airplane watching? telling lies? My FO is also a small airplane guy so there might be two of us.

I can rent a car if I need to...or catch a ride back to the airport on the hotel shuttle.. .whatever works

Lemme know...

(caveat: My work schedule can change, sometimes on short notice. I wouldn't want anyone to re-arrange their day too much without knowing that my best laid plans could fall apart)

Keith
take out the spaces below
kth getz (at) gmail (dot) com

I live about 80 miles north. How long will you be in the area?
George

Hi George,

We have a 5 am wake up call the next day so need to be back in the hotel by 7 to 8 pm.

So we will have most of the day. I'll gladly drive 80 miles if you will be around for a late lunch or early dinner.

Naw..that won't work. I'll be out of town Thu, but home on Fri/Sat and thought if you'd be there....
Perhaps another time.

darn.. that's too bad. Yes, I'll take a raincheck.

How about a recommendation of some way to spend the day... any neat airports within an hour or two drive of SAT? I've heard Texas has Bar-b-q. Would be nice to check out a bbq place with an airport view. I read all the posts on "$100 hamburgers in TX" but everything I looked at is 3 hours away.

San Antonio is a beautiful city, you have the river walk and take a boat ride through the city ,and you must visit the Alamo ,man the history is unbelievable. jump in a cab and ask the cabbie for a tour of the city. the shopping mall near the airport is great. restaurants are abundant in the mall. we stayed at the Crown Plaza and the shuttle bus will nearly take you any where.

+1 onThe River walk is great and lots of places to eat and shops. +1 onThe Alamo too the volunteers in the yellow shirts are very helpful as well.

We were there in April. Son graduated basic. Except for driving through, I had never been to San Antonio. For a very large city, I was very impressed with how nice the people are. Those folks don't act like they're in a hurry like most big cities. They even know how to drive. I could spend days downtown on the riverwalk/alamo area. Lots of history

Thanks everybody. Looks like the Riverwalk is the place to go. Thanks for the suggestions.
Keith

Really nice area Keith, I think you'll really like it. My wife wants to go back there and up to Fredricksburg! about an hour drive if I remember correctly. Let me know when you want to do lunch again.

Keith-
That picture Willie posted of Rudy's Bar B Q was taken at the Leon Springs exit off I-10 westbound just before Boerne, about 10 miles NW of San Antonio. Their BBQ is pretty good and the atmosphere is "pure Texas".

If you make it out to Fredericksburg (an hour drive each way from KSAT), try to eat supper in one of the German restaurants; Friedhelm's (1st choice, good air conditioning), Altdorf (outdoors if its not too hot), Rathskellar, or Der Lindenbaum. Also drive out to the Gillespie County Airport and check out the Hangar Hotel for future trip plans when you fly the 170 that way. You'll be impressed.

Also, be sure to stop at Luckenbach on the way back to SAT just for the experience. Guitar pickers are there every evening. The Farm Road that passes Luckenbach goes back into Boerne so you can make a nice loop.

The Riverwalk is best in the evening when the lights come on and the whole area comes alive. The Alamo takes a couple of hours to visit when its open so you might just want to drive by after dark, its lighted up very nicely.

I think you'll find it will take more than one trip see everything in the area.

I always found the riverwalk to be dirty water, 2-stroke outboard smoke, and flies on the sidewall-cafe food, which was ordinary, common Tex-Mex.
I suggest you go over to Stinson Field (yes, named after the Stinson family who developed the airplane) and visit the Texas Air Museum.
If you visit the Alamo,... then DON'T MISS the MENGER HOTEL, just across the alley, where Pres. Wilson addressed the crowds, and have a drink in the MENGER BAR. This is a hand-carved, exact copy (by the same workmen) who made the BAR in the House of Lords. (Where a young solicitor/barrister (lawyer) would have drinks of whiskey (scotch) until the older barristers could query him about English Common Law...and if he could answer correctly while intoxicated...he'd passed the BAR EXAM.)
The real SIGNIFICANCE of that bar in the Menger is: Teddy Roosevelt coaxed a group of cowboys to get drunk, then signed them up for his "rough riders" at .25 cents per day. They woke up hung-over on a train to Galveston, committed to Uncle Sam for the duration, where they embarked a steamer to Long Island for basic-training, ..then were transported to Cuba and WALKED up San Juan Hill. (Yes,..they were DISMOUNTED cavalry...their horses having accidentally been left in New York.)
When the Spanish-American War was over...a group of those angry rough-riders returned to San Antonio, and shot up the bar where they'd been hood-winked! (It's a gorgeous, carved piece of walnut, and a cool place to have a drink, right next door to the Alamo. It's also where Eisenhower, Truman, and FDR stayed while in SAT, and where Pres. J.F. Kennedy stayed just before travelling to Dallas. (Menger was an early Texas cattleman who made a fortune in beef, beer, and hotelery.) The interior garden of the Menger was initially within the outer walls of the Alamo fortress, and where the name-sake cottonwood tree existed from the time of the battle until recently. ("Alamo" means "cottonwood" in spanish...the river was originally lined with them. A branch from a cottonwood, if freshly cut, and placed into the ground to make a fence-post...will grow if watered, into a fine tree. The Menger tree grew from one of the original posts made for the Alamo corral,...unfortunately it died about ten years ago as was removed from the garden...but the garden is a lovely spot for breakfast...and THE MENGER is the hotel I'd recommend you stay while in SAT. There's a new section..and the old section...and of course, I prefer the old, with a view of the inner courtyard.)
Just two blocks from the Menger, on the river (now a bridge) at Commerce street, is where the famous exchange occured between the Texians and representatives of Santa Ana, where the "cannon shot reply" was instigated to Santa Ana's initial demand for surrender.
Difficult to imagine in the present-day, built-up city, but only 8 blocks or so West, is the San Fernando Catholic church where the approach of Santa Ana was observed, and where he stayed during his siege, and where he had the church bell tolled and the regimental band play "El Duguello"...the death-song, indicating "no quarter" for the Texians (whom he regarded as illegal immigrants, and whom he had warned that, in accordance with a presidential-decree, would be treated as Pirates if they did not leave the country.... so it is a bit more understandable why he executed even the survivors of the battle, except for the women and non-combatants.)

George

Well the day M.J. and I went for a boat ride the river was clean and the boat ran very nicely (no smoke) and we ate at a very nice restaurant and they did not serv the TEX-MEX food cuase I would have never stopped there........George you sure you were in San Anton

Would I take the boat ride again......prabably not...... but if you never have, it is a fun day event. My friend, Fr. Wagner has been there over 30 years and retired now from the USAF ...he took us around to many other places that I can't remember, but it is a fun city to visit.

W.

Thanks everybody.

I'll have to see what my flying partner wants to do... if he's up for renting a car and going for a drive we'll check out some of those suggested places.

Walt, yes, we should get together for lunch again. My schedule has been a bit hectic. Maybe things will settle down soon.

Keith

Trip Report:

My day in San Antonio was pretty nice.

My FO and I had bbq at a place called Bill Miller's. It was good, maybe not the best in Texas and it appeared to be a chain, but... we were hungry and it was right across the street from our hotel so we enjoyed it.

We then took a cab from the downtown area to Stinson Field (thanks George for the suggestion!) and the Texas Air Museum. Cab charge was $27 which seemed a bit high to go 6.5 miles. As soon as we exited the cab one of the volunteers at the museum asked me how much the cabbie charged us. He then told us that it should be about $20 and the cabbies are known for driving all over creation to run the bill up. He said one couple had a $90 cab ride by the time they got there. Not knowing any better, they paid it. So... if you go there and use a cab, watch out!

The Texas Air Museum was ok. Certainly worth the $4 entry fee. There were three gentlemen there who appeared to be retired from their day jobs and volunteering a day or two a week. They told us the history of Stinson Field and some of the history of the airplanes there. As we chatted with them, word got around that the cabbie had probably stiffed us a little bit and one of the guys offered us a ride back to town as his shift was ending and he was driving that direction anyway. We took him up on it ... aren't small airport people just the nicest? !!

We then wandered around the Riverwalk area for a while. We didn't spend a lot of time there but I think I could enjoy an evening there. I've been to a couple of these "riverwalk" areas in other cities and I thought San Antonio's was much better than others I've seen. I did get enveloped in a cloud of marine engine smoke one time as one of those tourist boat drivers threw his prop into reverse and belched out a fog that covered about half a block. Other than that, it was nice.

I roamed around a bit reading the historical markers, learned that San Antonio was first settled by Canary Islanders (I never would have guessed that!) and saw a church with a sign that said the remains of the heroes of the Alamo were buried there.

Then I was out of time and it was back to the hotel to get ready for my early wake up call the next day....

Overall a nice day and I learned enough about San Antonio that I will go back for a longer visit when I get the chance. They've done a nice job of revitalizing that downtown area. Thanks to all for the suggestions.

Oh yeah.. thanks to George I also learned a new word. "Texian".