We are not much for shopping and crowds anyway but for sure not today. We went for a bike ride (had to stop and warm in the sun by the lake since a pretty serious cold front has moved in). No fishing today, just too chilly. Goofed off and puttered around camp. A nice relaxing day. We extended our stay one more day since campgrounds are really full this weekend. Seems that lots of Texas folks camp for Thanksgiving. We shouldn’t have any trouble getting into another park Sunday after the locals head back to work.

It dawned on us that this is the first year we will celebrate as just the two of us. We are planning a pretty traditional dinner with turkey and all the trimmings including pumpkin pie I will be baking tonight. We have many things for which we are thankful and family will be in our thoughts.

Turkey Day is here!
It is a bright beautiful morning just right for a walk. We saw a heron, egret, some cormorants and what I think were coots (goose looking ducks) along with the regulars like mallards and seagulls. I can hear lots of song birds in the high forest canopy but haven’t identified any of them yet.
Dinner came out pretty good would say. We topped it off with a nice bottle of New Mexico Chardonnay and called it good. Got to check in with family too so overall, a great day.

Lake Livingston is our first State Park with a lake large enough top launch the boat to really fish…………. and when the weather is warm enough to get out on it. It is to be in the 80s for a couple days. That is plenty warm especially since the humidity is 69% plus. It feels like August not late November. We are going to stay a few days and try our hand at catching striped bass and avoiding catching catfish. Wish us luck.
The local bait shops were out of worms so we had to dig our own crawlers. It’s been a long time since we have done that! Armed with those hared earned night crawlers, we headed out. We both fished…Lynn drowned worms and Kent landed 1 small catfish. At least it was a pretty day to be out in the boat; at least until we headed in for the day. The wind had kicked up and the waves were HUGE and we were about 3 miles from the ramp. By the time we arrived we were both soaking wet and freezing. We even had our life jackets on! Way too rough

The first evening was a romantic evening for two along the river walk in downtown San Antonio. We strolled and people watched and sampled margaritas along the way. A nice quiet evening. We skipped the shopping that is EVERYWHERE. That is for tomorrow.

Remember the Alamo
We read and listened and walked and looked. Pretty interesting history. I suspect that the people who actually lived at this mission were more that a little irritated at those crazies that decided that it should be their last stand. Really trashed the place. It is wonderfully restored and a fun history lesson. We walked surface streets today and checked out old churches and other old buildings. Then on to the shopping.

The Marketplace
Wow. I never saw so much stuff. It is like a giant flea market with some higher end stores thrown in. We looked and laughed but didn’t find anything we had to have. Sombreros, cowboy hats, boots, clay thingys, paper mache thingys, T-shirts with nearly anything printed on them, bright colored clothes and jewelry. Fun.

Missions National Park
We checked out the four other Missions in San Antonio that are part of the park. It is an amazing story for the Indians who lived in this area. They didn’t stand a chance of maintaining their own way of life between the Spanish Crown who wanted to claim their land, the Catholic Friars who wanted to claim their souls, and the raiding Apache from the North who wanted to claim their stuff. They were pretty much screwed. Mission life with all the rules and the push to change even how they think and believe had to be a bummer; but, you so what you have to do to survive I guess. The volunteer docent at the Mission San Juan was a direct descendent of the Indians who were at the original mission. He was very excited to tell his family story and the story of the Tejas culture that was borne of this attempt to make Spanish citizens of the locals. One day maybe I will read up on the Indians’ side of this story. I am sure that we haven’t heard the whole story from all perspectives. Beautiful buildings that are both simple yet ornately decorated with stone carving and wall paintings (colors created from bug innards and plants). The Catholic Church brought stone masons and woodworkers and artists from around the world and their work shows up in the Mission Churches. They are spending millions now to restore them. At Mission San Jose there are two world renown stone restoration experts here working on the front façade. Wonderful to know they will be around for many more years for people to appreciate.

BBQ – we found a down-home kind of place and had some great mesquite smoked, dry rub BBQ. Add some of their own home made sauce and it was all finger licking good.

I am already behind is consuming the wines I bought in New Mexico so I tried a different approach here. There was a chocolate store that had locally made liquid filled chocolates. Guess what they are filled with?! You got it, local wines. We got samples and they were magnificent. So, there is a box of those chocolates in the frig which I hope I can resist eating so we can have them at family Christmas in PA. A month in a half is a long time. I have the web address just in case I need to order replacements. We tried their silk fudge too. It is a semi sweet chocolate and super smooth. GOOD stuff.