The Yellow Rose of Texas

OK, so THIS rose really isn't from Texas, it's out in our garden, but I thought it was a great way to introduce the trip to San Antonio I took this past weekend.

It was the National Home Builders Association 2006 National Conference on Membership & our local chapter, the Building Industry Association of Whatcom County decided to send our whole committee to this meeting. Cool!

Eight of us left on Thursday (another fellow joined us in San Antonio - he'd been in Detroit on business) and flew directly out of Bellingham (a relatively new occurrence with the addition of Delta Airlines to our airport) - into Salt Lake City - then connected to San Antonio - great flights - pretty much got where we were going on time, etc. The conference was held at the Westin La Cantera Resort (http://www.westinlacantera.com/) Very beautiful place - I thought the rooms were a little over priced, (but then I wasn't paying for it) however, the "Heavenly" bed and the double headed shower were pretty neat. Oh, & the other thing about the resort - it's 12 miles from the airport & 15 miles from down town, and they don't have a shuttle ( I guess $300 a night doesn't pay enought for a shuttle?) Any how, think $50 a pop anytime you want to go to OR from the hotel to down town, etc. ! Holy cab fare, batman!













As you can see, Friday was a beautiful day, and suprisingly enough, it was only in the high 70's - it has been hovering around 85 degrees or so for the last few weeks & about 74% humidity! So we were lucky with our choice of days to go down town to see the Alamo & The River Walk. (Yes, that's me on the left with my chubby knees showing).

The Alamo was very inspiring - that a small band of men should have wanted to fight so hard and lose their lives to keep that part of Texas free. "People worldwide continue to remember the Alamo as a heroic struggle against overwhelming odds — a place where men made the ultimate sacrifice for freedom."
(http://www.thealamo.org/)

But as you can see, history has not stopped the city from literally growing up right around the Alamo grounds. It is now within a block of huge skyscrapers and modern hotels.

San Antonio's most famous tourist destination, The River Walk was conceived in the 1920's after they had several bad floods in San Antonio - a dam & a canal were finally completed in the '40's and since then several extensions and repairs & additions have been done - including a botanical garden .







There are sidewalks on both sides, altho not railings on both sides - I wonder how many people they drop in the drink every year?


We had dinner at a place called Dicks - pretty good ribs - VERY good margaritas! Then we went out to explore the rest of the area - some of the group went bar hopping - Thankfully Robin & Del were ready to go back to the hotel so I didn't have to pay that $50 cab fare all by myself.

In a few days (when I get caught up with life in general), I'll post some about the conference & tell you all about our trip home (ever hear of the "trip form hell"?)