San Antonio Missions

Yesterday we visited San Antonio's very own National Park--The San Antonio Missions National Historical Park.  We started at the visitor's center at the San Jose Mission where we were unable to get Jr. Park Ranger booklets.  Guess we'll have to do that another time.  However, we did pick up a NPS Passport booklet.  We're thinking about making it a family goal to visit each National Park before Andrew leaves for college.

We got to try out being Park Rangers--or at least try on their outfits! =)

The San Jose Mission was the Queen of the San Antonio missions.  It's been mostly restored, including the wall around the compound which included defenses like those we're inside above and living quarters and ovens like below.

Calvin took off to check out the rooms on his own.

Above you can see a rear view of the mission.  The Convento, which is where the priests lived and did their work, hasn't been restored.  That's what all the arches are.

The kids enjoyed looking in every well we came across to see how far down it went.  They're either all fakes or have been filled in.

You can see that these buildings used to be painted with beautiful colors.  We watched a movie showing the building completely painted, but it didn't seem real until we saw this on the side.

The facade around the front doors and rose window were heavily carved.  Very cool.

This is a cool replica map from the 1500s when they didn't really know what the world looked like.  America and Asia are attached at the top.  Antarctica is gigantic and there's no Australia.  There's also strange creatures including mermaids, giant sea creatures, camels in Antarctica, etc.  Very cool map. 

This is a picture of a gristmill, the first in North America.  It's a lot bigger than our little electric one.

We followed the Missions Trail and found another Mission.  This had a little fun Visitors' Center with a display of different stuff the indians would eat.  I commented on them eating Cicada's (noisy little bugs).  Sure enough, they would even eat dirt if they were hungry enough.  Another reminder that we are definitely very blessed to live where and when we do.

This Mission (San Juan?) had a 1/3 mile nature hike and how could we pass that up.  It followed along the San Antonio River with some downward slopes to get down and touch the water.  Calvin wanted to do it himself and slid his behind right on down.

We saw a lot more cool and fun stuff, but I'll take a break for now.