Spring Break Day 2 Part 1 - Trolley Tour

Sunday night we arrived in San Antonio late, so we checked into the hotel, and ordered food from a Chinese Pizza delivery.  We had dolmas, spaghetti and meatballs, and fettuccine Alfredo.  Not great, but sustaining.  Although, my dolmas were pretty good.  We all crashed pretty quickly.

The hotel was quite lovely.  The Hilton Garden Inn was one of my favorite hotels I've stayed in.  The open air concept lobby is inviting.

Not totally unexpectedly, we didn't get up as early as we might have wanted to get a start on our sightseeing.  But, it's vacation and we enjoyed it.

I love the breakfasts at Hilton hotels.  They always have lots of fresh fruit, oatmeal, Belgian waffles, and an egg/omelet station.  The best part is I don't have to cook!  That makes it taste even better.

After breakfast we headed downtown.  By noon the line to get into the Alamo was already around half the block.  We opted for a tour trolley.  Our experience has taught us the trolley tours are the best way to see a city we're visiting.

The Alamo Tour guide was a humorous, knowledgeable 74 year native of San Antonino.  

Our tour left from the Alamo and went by the Institute of Texas Cultures and Tower of the Americas.  Along the way our guide gave us interesting history and facts about San Antonio and the sites we were seeing.

Institute of Texas Cultures 

Alamodome, where Poteet Band played in state marching competition Daniel's Freshman year 

The Alamodome is also where the guys in the family went to a Texas-Iowa game a few years back.

The San Antonio River is currently under construction to widen it and make trails and parks.

Mission San Jose

Mission Concepcion

Mission Concepcion

The old Lone Star Brewery

C.H. Guenther & Son, Inc. is the corporate office of Pioneer Flour Mills.  This is particularly interesting to me because after 160 years the company is still owned by family descendants.  These days 160 years of a family business is pretty awesome.  This is the company that makes White Wings Flour among other things.  The original Guenther House remains in its original location in San Antonio and reflects the 1902 remodeling done by Guenther's son.  We didn't get to see the house, but the story is interesting.  Perhaps we'll visit it our next trip to San Antonio.