Trip Report: March 15, 2009-March 19, 2009 -- We once again used my parent's Wyndham Vacation Resort account to spend some time away from home, this occasion at San Antonio during Trenton ISD spring break.  We planned to take the kids to Sea World and The Alamo.  Additionally we planned to sample some great local eateries along the way.

March 15, 2009 -- We packed the Escort and pulled out of Trenton a little before 7:00 AM.  We stopped at the Waffle House in McKinney, Texas for breakfast.  We enjoyed sitting at the bar and listening to the good natured banter of the wait staff.  We shopped at the Round Rock, Texas outlet mall for Victoria a pair of formal shoes for the upcoming  Trenton High School Junior/Senior Prom.  We decided  to drive through Lockhart, Texas and have a late lunch at Smitty's Market home of some of the best Bar-B-Que sausage available.  Lockhart is considered by many to be the epicenter of Texas Bar-B-Que and Smitty's Market is one of the top five Bar-B-Que restaurants in Texas according to Texas Monthly.  Smitty's is best know for the German style sausage links they make and serve.

We arrived at the Wyndham La Cascada on the river in down town San Antonio a little before five PM.  We found the room comfortable and well appointed.  The decorating was much better than most of the Wyndham Vacation Resorts we have stayed at in the past.  Most of those have been a "corny" themed interior  reflecting the outdoor activities of the geographic area.  It is almost like Wyndham Vacation Resorts assume that anyone who enjoys outdoor activities have a corresponding lack of taste.

March 16, 2009 -- Monday morning we left the Resort and drove to The Guenther House for an excellent breakfast.  The Guenther House, on the corporate headquarters of Pioneer Flour Mills, is a very well known local landmark and is often the scene of various celebrity sightings.  The service is friendly and personable.  The cuisine is excellent -- we had some of the tallest, "fluffiest" biscuits we have ever seen.

From The Guenther House we proceeded to Sea World.  Now this turned out to be a colossal mistake.  The number of people spring break brought overwhelmed the local traffic infrastructure as it took almost two hours the last two miles to the park.   (We later learned from locals that there are some back roads that will take one past the traffic bottle neck -- just as we suspected while sitting in traffic).  We spent a great deal of time sitting in theaters and standing in line due to the tremendous number of people in the park.  Further investigation indicated that there was a record set attendance set that day.  Sea World is clearly very ill equipped to deal with such large crowds and should be avoided during peak times like spring break.  At the Viva show theater in Sea World we came across the Hunnicutts, friends from Greenville, Texas.

By mid-afternoon our comfort level in dealing with crowds had ben surpassed for the day and we left to drive to La Fugato Mexican Cuisine.  La Fugato, which has won local, state, and national awards, is another highly recommended local landmark. The food was prepared excellently prepared from fresh ingredients and well plated.   We were treated to live mariachi music during the course of our stay.  If there was any criticism it would be the pricing was higher than we are used to paying.

Unfortunately, the long traffic lines at Sea World and Your's Truly leaving the head lights on resulted in a very drained battery.  The manager of the La Fogata graciously jumped the Escort off and we made it back to the Wyndham Vacation Resort with out incident.

March 17, 2009 -- The Alamo was the second major destination of our trip.  Our aim was to get there early before the crowds and go the complex.  We boarded a shuttle provided by Wyndham Vacation Resorts for traveling to destinations within the immediate down town and river walk are. The Alamo was excellent in execution and meaning.  The optional audio tour is filled with various tidbits of information that really help make the history come alive.  By the time we were finished about noon the line to get in the Alamo was literally down the street and around the corner.  An interesting aside is that we ran into our two of our Tige Lane neighbors also vacationing in San Antonio during our Alamo visit. The shuttle wasn't due back in the area until 12:30 PM so we stopped by the Haagen Dazs ice cream store across from the Alamo. 

That evening we had an early dinner at one of the original river front establishments the Casa Rio Mexican Restaurant.  Casa Rio was established in 1946 and offers excellent Mexican cuisine at reasonable prices.

After dinner we walked several blocks to the San Antonio Museum of Art.  The San Antonio Museum of Art is located in an old brewery and has been renovated to really show the art to good advantage.  The San Antonio Museum of Art is best known for it's central American and Hispanic art collection, but has excellent collections from a variety of locations and eras from 3000 BC to contemporary.  The museum was displaying works from local artists John Hernandez and Cooder Vincent Valdez.  Charlie, a volunteer guide and a retired veteran's administration employee, made our visit a delight.  Charlie gave us an excellent over view as we progressed through all the museum's major collections.  As the tour progressed we steadily lost tour group members (mostly elderly) for a variety reasons.  Our visit to the San Antonio Museum of Art was the most relaxing destination of our trip.  I highly recommend visiting the San Antonio Museum of Art.

We took a cab back to the Wyndham Vacation Resort.  Our Yellow Cab driver was personable and professional.  As I was the was only one to have ever ridden in a cab the rest of the family found the ride an event of sorts. 

March 18, 2009 -- We sent the day relaxing in the room, by the pool, and following Victoria around Rivercenter Mall. 

March 19, 2009 -- We grabbed left-overs for breakfast and got a relatively early start.  We shopped for Victoria and Nathaniel at the outlet mall in San Marcus.  

South of Austin we stopped by to look at a rear bumper for the Escort at Capital City Auto Parts.  The bumper turned out to be in very good shape so I purchased the bumper intending to haul it back to Trenton somehow.  Joleen and Victoria ran to get some items to strap the bumper to the Escort from a nearby Wal-Mart.  After some deliberation and consideration of sizing and aerodynamics it became clear that the easiest way to transport the bumper was to just replace the old one on the spot.  We borrowed some tools, partially unloaded the Escort, pulled the old bumped, and installed the replacement bumper.

By the time we got the Escort put back together it was approaching 4:30 PM and we were south of Austin.  Anyone who knows Austin knows the time to drive north on IH-35 is not during late afternoon.  We set the GPS for home but began to head east.  We intersected IH-35 at Temple, Texas.  The traffic was terrible with a high concentration of Texas Highway Patrolman between Salado and Waco adding to the stupidity exhibited by drivers who tended to speed when not in sight of a patrolman and suddenly braking when a patrolman was sighted.

Just south of Waco the traffic slowed again.  We noted that a Suzuki Boulevard in the right lane had lost power and the rider was being forced by the "fast lane" traffic up against the "wall of death".  I put on the emergency flashers and slowed to force the traffic to slow so the motorcyclist could get out fully in the lane and off the "wall".  With the flashers still going I turned the nose of the Escort into the right-hand lane and momentarily blocked both lanes, therefore allowing the bike to move to the right-hand lane.  I followed the motorcyclist, who turned out to be a young service man from North Dakota, to the shoulder and assured that he was safe, had a cell phone, and someone to contact.  The Suzuki then fired so we followed him to the next truck stop and assured that he made it off the Interstate.

We got back to home to Trenton at about 10:00 PM.

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