It was a busy day being a tourist in San Antonio. We first went for a a bit of a drive getting into town and then in the town centre area before heading over to do a tour of the Alamo. San Antonio is an interesting city in that you have very old (eg: Alamo) in the downtown area, next to hotels and tourist spots. The Alamo itself is quite spacious with beautifully maintained gardens. Inside the building, you are asked to be quiet, don't touch the walls, no videos, and please respect the area as it is regarded as a shrine. There is a model of the original Alamo during the seige by Santa Ana and lots of original pieces of equipment on display. You could feel the history seeping from the walls. Very very interesting.
From the Alamo, we had intended to do the "Riverwalk" but Dale took a bit of a tumble off a curb so decided it would be best if we did a "Riverdrive". Traffic in the downtown area is a bit slow as the right hand lane is for busses only and/or only if you are making a right turn, the left lane is for parking only (and left turns where allowed), so you only have the middle lane to travel in....slowly!
We had read about the El Mercado, Farmer's Market and the restaurant called "Mi Tierra" so we headed out that way. Of course, to add interest to the journey, we turned right when we should have turned left and toured quite a bit of the mainly Mexican dominated area of southwest San Antonio. In the end, we did stop and ask for directions and eventually found our way there.
After parking the car, we started to walk towards the El Mercado and Dale took another fall. This one somewhat more serious. He badly scraped his left knee (of course it is always the bad knee that takes the brunt of falls) and ripped the knee of his new trousers, and scraped his right knee as well, plus bruising his elbow. Thank goodness, for once, he had his hands out of his pockets on both falls otherwise the damage could have been a lot worse. A couple of bystanders witnessed this and came immediately to the rescue. They helped me get him to the nearby restaurant where we were able to sit down, get some ice and a bandage. Dale was in some discomfort so we stayed in the restaurant to have a bite to eat and drink until he was feeling less "shocky".
After this brief respite, he said he was feeling Ok and wanted to tour through the markets, which we did for a short time. In the end he sat on a bench while I did a quick breeze through the remaining shops. Picked up three Mexican blankets to use outside at Palm Springs, then we headed for home. Once Dale was settled, got his poor knees cleaned and applied ointment and clean bandages then I went out to the drugstore to pick up more large bandages. Now well prepared for any emergency!
So, to say the least, we are spending a quiet evening at home. Will see how he is feeling in the a.m., before we make a decision as to whether we stay a day and rest or continue our trek west....
The weather continues to be very very warm and as we travel we seem to be in between storms. They are all around us but we have experienced nothing but sunshine for quite some time. Hope that continues to be the case over the next few days as well.
Till next time, keep well, travel safe...
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