While it was a hot night with very little breeze, we had at least parked our RV under a tree overnight, making it marginally cooler.
Remember the Alamo
Parking was going to be difficult at The Alamo, so we walked about 20 minutes or so to get there instead. The Alamo is one of the most famous historic sites in Texas, but it actually started out in the 1700s as Mission San Antonio de Padua, part of a chain of Spanish missions set up to teach and convert local Native Americans, which are now a UNESCO World Heritage Site. By the early 1800s, it had been turned into a military outpost. It became famous in 1836 during the Battle of the Alamo, when a small group of Texans, including Davy Crockett, held out for 13 days against General Santa Anna’s Mexican forces before being overtaken. Their courage turned the Alamo into a symbol of Texas independence, inspiring the well-known phrase, “Remember the Alamo.”
Today, the Alamo stands as a preserved historic site in downtown San Antonio, where visitors can explore the original chapel, view artifacts from the battle, and walk through the peaceful gardens that surround the site. There are different tours available, but it's free to simply wander in and check out the grounds and buildings, which we did and found to be very informative since we didn't know much about the history of The Alamo before coming here!
Smith's BBQ
We headed back to the San Antonio River Walk, pausing for a while to see how the Lock & Dam worked, with the river barges being raised and lowered to let a boat sail through to the other side. We had contemplated checking out the last two missions in San Antonio, but you guessed it: it was stinking hot! Michael had been craving Texan BBQ, and we found a highly rated food truck called Smith's Bar-B-Que, which we drove a little out of the way for because of the reviews; it seems to be in a bit of an industrial area.
The food didn't disappoint! It's a no-frills food truck, with the only signage being for the 2 meat/2 sides or 4 meat/2 sides options (you have to ask what the meat and side options are)! Michael ordered the 2 meat/2 sides combo, picking brisket and ribs as well creamed corn and baked beans. Texas is known for brisket, and the food was also really good value ($13, cash only), compared to the other places we'd seen online (even other food trucks). At the moment, out of the 3 BBQ places that we've been to (Joe's and Jones Bar-B-Que both in Kansas City), Smith's comes second after Jones, according to Michael's reviews. Sheila definitely loved Smith's Bar-B-Que as well, of course!
Heading to Corpus Christi
It was going to take us ab out 2.5 hours to get to Corpus Christi. There weren't any stops we wanted to make along the way, but we could tell that we were arriving at Corpus Christi because we eventually saw a ton of oil refineries in the distance, all dotted across the horizon.
As we drove closer to the coast, we were inundated with Whataburger fast food chains: there were at least nine in close succession to each other! We researched this later, and it turns out that Whataburger is headquartered in San Antonio and opened its first restaurant in Corpus Christi, so it makes sense now as to why they're so dominant here (although Michael tried it yesterday but wasn't wowed).
Driving through Texas has been a bit intense because of all of the highways and overpasses criss-crossing on top of each other. At one point, we drove along, only to be told to get off the highway. Fortunately, Michael trusted his instincts and kept driving on the road that we were on that was over a bridge, but Google didn't recognize the road, and it appeared that we were driving in the sky! We had to laugh at Google's GPS folly, and were happy to note that it shaved about 9 minutes from the trip.
We had booked to stay at On the Beach RV Park at Port Aransas, on the outskirts of Corpus Christi, a stone's throw from the beach at Port Aransas. Port Aransas is a city on Mustang Island, and we had to drive across a bridge to get to the island, which reminded us of when we drove across the long bridge from mainland Florida to get to the Florida Keys. It was still a drive along the thin strip of the island to get to Port Aransas, where the landscape changed dramatically from highways, oil refineries and heavy industry, to seaside houses and resorts, ocean views, and one lane to take us all the way to the RV park.
We were very excited to be back on the beach (we haven't been to the beach since we were in Washington state!), and cool down a bit at the Gulf of Mexico! The RV Park is along the road, so it can get a bit of noise from the cars driving along (and we we had the spot right by the road), but the RV park otherwise was clean and well maintained. Michael had thought that there was a pool at this RV park, but we soon rationalized, who needs a pool when we're a few minutes' walk to the beach? We spent the early evening with Sheila running around on the water, which was glorious. What's interesting is that cars (and plenty of golf carts) are allowed to drive into the beach and just park in there, and we found out that we could simply purchase a permit that would allow us to park and camp on the beach!
When we got back to the RV park, we washed off the sand by the outdoor shower, and then sat outside the RV, having dinner and drying off with a lovely, cool ocean breeze. What a welcome relief to have this ocean air to sleep comfortably tonight!
Route Map
