Cruising the San Antonio

On Thursday morning in San Antonio, we walked a couple of blocks from our hotel to have breakfast at this little cafe, SIP . . . considerably less expensive than having breakfast in the hotel! It was a good place to grab some coffee, a croissant or yogurt and granola. The River Walk area must be "convention headquarters." All along the River Walk are high rise hotels, but they're slightly set back, so you don't really notice them while you're on the river. But it's very creative planning how many hotels have a section along the river and access to it. The River Walk area is one flight down from street level, so the river and walk itself seems to be in a world all its own. If you want access to a regular downtown city, you just walk up one of the flights of stairs at the street/intersection of your choice. The River Walk reminded me of a combination Venice, Mardi Gras and Deliverance (especially at night, along some of the off-the-beaten-track areas.)



Doug and I decided to grab a River taxi to get to the starting point for the River Walk tour/cruise. The River taxi runs throughout a loop around the downtown area, along the river, and we bought an all-day ticket for $10 each. As Jason, our guide said, to flag down the taxi, you have to wave your ticket around or do something emphatic to get the operator's attention; just a "wave" won't do, because people wave to him all day long, just to wave. It's kind of like flagging a taxi, but it operates more like a bus. Only later did I recognize this as a problem.

In theory, the taxi will pick you up anywhere along the river. One problem is that there are very few taxis operating and lots of tour boats operating. The only way to tell the difference is by the checked black and yellow flag on the back of the taxi. There's about 2 taxis operating on the river and 25 tours at any given time.



Could Doug look any more blissed out? (Well, yes he could, but that's private.)
We took the taxi to the Rivercenter Mall, where we could catch the tour boat. This tour cost about $13.50 for both of us, and was a 40 minute narrated tour all along the river. It was a nice way to learn some of the details of the River Walk area, and to get more photos from the river. The guide told us that during the day, he's seen many children fall into the river, and at night, it tends to be drunk tourists who topple into the river. Fortunately, it's only 3 feet deep, so most people simply stand up.

This set of umbrellas is supposed to be one of the most photographed stretches along the river. The San Antonio overran its banks in 1921 and Robert Hugman challenged the plan to cement it over through a 1930's WPA project. In the 1960s it was refurbished for the HemisFair and became very popular as a tourist attraction. It's certainly popular with me right now!

San Antonio, Texas--How To Get Lost Less

How to Get Lost Less:

Step 1: Get new glasses the week before your trip so you can actually read the maps and street signs. Surprisingly, this helps a lot.

Step 2: Print out lots of maps to carry in your purse. And carry a guide book with you just in case.

Step 3: Add a compass to your purse.

Step 4: Go to a city that has these guys posted all over (Not Doug, just the guy on the right):

They have GUIDES along the Riverwalk!!!! How cool is that? Now, they weren't always exactly accurate in what they told me, but they were about 80% of the time, which helped a lot!

Step 5: Go to a city that even puts these signs up along the poles on many streets:

We weren't in San Antonio very long, just one evening (Wednesday, and then another full day and night - Thursday). But I tried to prepare for the trip by reading through two guide books, the skinny little DK Eyewitness Travel Top 10 San Antonio & Austin. . . which has a little fold-out map in the back. . . and Frommer's San Antonio & Austin. I also made a list of the places I wanted to photograph, because I knew that I was going to try and pack a lot into roughly 36 hours.

Frommer's suggested Acenar for dinner, and their recommendations was excellent! We ordered quesadillas for an appetizer. . . and then I decided that between that, the chips and salsa, and the margarita, I really didn't need to order dinner as well! Doug has this instinctive voodoo built-in radar for food, and ordered the tacos filled with crabmeat tinga (a mix of onions, tomatoes and chiles with avocado), which turned out to be one of the recommendations in the guidebook. This was a moderately priced restaurant.

It was right across the river from the Aztec theatre, a refurbished 1926 movie theatre. In the lobby, there's a special effects show with a pagan feathered-serpent god rising up through the floor. This is free, happens every 90 minutes and lasts about 5 minutes. Unfortunately, we didn't know about this until I read about it later. Bummer.



As it becomes evening along the river, the atmosphere changes dramatically. It takes on a colorful, ethereal dimension, and the pace definitely picks up with a more festive, slightly alcohol-infused tempo. There's about 35 footbridges along the 3 miles of the river, all different, and I really liked how the lights were reflected in the water.



Tomorrow, I'll start with our barge tour.

RiverWalk, San Antonio, Texas

Call me dramatic, but I'm beginning to think that there are huge swaths of our country that are not. . . well. . . . frozen! This is San Antonio, Texas, and Doug and I had the wonderful good fortune to get to go to a conference there this past week.

The RiverWalk is listed in 1000 Places to See Before You Die. But you could almost die of bliss, just being there in March! This first photo is of one of the RiverWalk tour boats that motors along for about 40 minutes along the walk.


Doug and I got back to Grand Forks last night, and we're still bracing for the blizzard that should be moving into our area tonight. When I got off work tonight, I scraped about 6" of snow off my car.

Blizzard Warning

Well, it IS March, after all. We got back to Grand Forks last night, and this morning's forecast for tomorrow, Tuesday, is "No travel advised. The northern side of a "Colorado low" is expected to bring 6 to 12 inches of snow and strong winds and wind chills getting down as low as 42 degrees below zero across much of eastern North Dakota by early Wenesday. Travel may become nearly impossible and will be dangerous, and Tuesday is expected to "white out" at times." *sigh* Can't wait.

And this is what we just left. 86 degrees. Warmth. Sunshine. Green things. Non-frozen water.



Can you guess which location is more likely to be featured in my photos over the next few days? The white place, or the green place?

Brian in London

Which version of the vicious Brian shamelessly assaulting his very own mother (with snow) do you like better?

I'm like playing with the technique I described yesterday. . . but although more colorful, I'm not sure if I like it more than "real" (whatever "real" is in Photoshop Era.)


Thanks for looking!

Lab Mode & Sponge

I thought I'd play around with this photo of Brian and Dianna in London. I cropped it to just focus on Dianna (sorry, Brian; guess the truth is out about who's the favorite. Just remember you both complain about photos posted:) )

I wanted to try the stuff used for "urban backgrounds." I duplicated this, switched to "lab" mode, multiply blend layer, reduced the opacity, masked back Dianna's face & hair,and I switched back to RGB mode. Then I sponged, increasing saturation in areas I wanted to intensify.

I added a warming filter, and then burned the edges a bit.

It was just fun to play with!

This Week's Theme: Favorite Things

This week's theme is "favorite things," and Doug is certainly not a "thing" , but he definitely makes it into my "favorites" folder! He's working away on a recumbent exercise bike. .. a bike I actually bought for myself and then within days was being put in walking casts. I've never been successfully able to use it, but I'm so glad that my sweetie is putting it to good use!

I included this photo because I wanted you to see the strange statue/wooden thing sitting behind Doug on the mantle. (He bought it, not me.) Doesn't that look like a little creature that would fly out and land on your bed in a Stephen King novel? If I were using the bike, I don't thing I'd do it with that behind me!

I also wanted you to see the shirt he's wearing. You can't see what it says, but it says "Night of the Living Fringe" and "It's a No-Brainer", and there's a black and white graphic of a brain image on the front. It's from a Fringe Festival in Winnepeg.

Airplane Plants and my SB800

You know the expression that if you get a new hammer, then everything looks like a nail? Well, I've been playing with my SB800 flash and using it on everything. I got it for Christmas, but really hadn't spent a lot of time with it until recently. Today I learned how to attach the SD800 to the SB800---that's the little compartment that adds a 5th AA battery to the flash, and causes the unit to recharge much, much faster.

This plant is an airplane plant--basically, a spider plant with curly leaves. I really like the curvy metal hanging basket that it's in. I have this hanging in my bay window to help block the ugly, ugly Hitch 'n Go that's outside our window. Hopefully, this plant will get much larger soon. It's replacing a spider plant that just couldn't handle my inconsistent attention, although it did wonderfully shield us from Hitch 'n Go for about 10 years.

When we bought our house, the realtor told us that the commercial property was required to put up a fence, and that would be happening soon. Yeah. Right. So our neighbors are Hitch 'n Go, and Happy Joe's Pizza. Doug and I are worse than plants; we establish roots, and then just don't change anything. So we've lived in this house for 25 years. With Hitch 'n Go and Happy Joe's noise. We've had the same two vehicles for 13 and 11 years. And if and when we have to give them up, we'll. . . . well. . . . cry.

Bonnie Says, "So Say We All"

The Beautiful Miss Bonnie has another book review for you. She's giving the whole BattleStar Gallactica series and the book, So Say We All, by Richard Hatch, four paws up and one lick of the tongue. And a little drool.

Have you been following Battlestar Gallactica??? There's only 3 episodes left, when it's all suppose to make sense, and I both can't wait, and am already grieving that the series will end. It's a complicated Science Fiction soap opera with battles and betrayals in relationship, and identity crisis, and political intrigue, and religious philosophy/existential meaning-making and plenty of cliff-hangers to keep you on the edge of your seat. I've gotten lost enough in the series to have to consult salon.com's very nice synopsis and cliff notes (but don't look into this if you plan on starting the series; too many spoilers!). Bonnie certainly knows what she's barking about with this recommendation.

One of the main characters is a female pilot, Starbucks, with authority issues. She makes me think about the "Rules" for girls. (This is an aside; it's not in the series.) These days, girls have Rules: be pretty & nice, be athletic and competitive, be perfect. Well, Starbucks has it all going for her, except the "nice" part.

But think about how seriously sad it is that these "Rules" are operating in our society these days! Not horrible rules in themselves, but it's not in balance for ourselves and our daughters. I mean, no one should get bonus points for trying to be ugly, for pushing people down stairs, or stapling themselves to the couch, or doing everything with no effort whatsoever. But I think there's a lot of pressure on young girls (especially) to stay tightly within these Rules, and underlying fears that "no one will love me," if they don't. Well, hopefully we can try to raise our daughters (and ourselves as adults) to know that it's even more important that they care enough about themselves, value themselves and know that they shouldn't have to earn basic respect, to stand up for themselves and question the rigidity of these rules.

So let's all go out and color outside the lines today! Bonnie says we should. . .

Paper Whites

Paper Whites! I was in a florist shop in Minneapolis with Brian, after our London trip. We were getting the oil changed on his car, and while waiting, wandered over to the florist shop. There was a bucket of mysterious bulbs, $1 each, and the clerk explained that all I'd have to do is drop them in water, and they'd grow. Even during the long, dreaded, ND winter. So I did, and about 10 days later, this is how they looked:

And now, a week after that, here they are:



Such a nice contrast to how it looks outside my window. (See blog header!)