We woke up on the fourth morning in San Antonio. I was surprised to see on a map that the only other state in the continental US where one can be further south than San Antonio is Florida. It was quite pleasant, however, in November. For our first stop, we headed out to the San Jose Mission, one of those established by Spanish priests in 1720. We had an excellent tour guide who showed us around the area that once housed native Americans and a few Spaniards.
View towards the chapel inside Mission San Jose
The water mill for grinding flour was operating. It was a treat to see just how it worked. Compared to grinding by hand, they must have thought this was technology never to be surpassed.
Flour mill at Mission San Jose
Then we took the 1.5 hour drive to Austin in order to see the impressive State Capitol building made out of pink granite. (By the way, that spelling with an “o” is about the only time that it is correct. If you stick with “a” you ‘ll be right just about all the time.)
Texas State Capitol in Austin
I do like Texas, more and more. I especially like it this week, with all the news coming out of New York. It’s hard to believe people can be like that. Good thing I don’t have a Facebook account or I could really light some fires. Ok, back to Texas. In this room here, the state senators meet—once every two years. Brilliant idea, frankly. We should try that with the US Congress, only cut it back to once every four years. And give them the same amount of pay ($7,200).
Texas State Senate Room
We figured out that he would smile if we ‘d tell him to touch his belly. We learned, however, that there are side effects.
We spent the rest of the day and into the evening (until they kicked us out) in the fabulous Bob Bullock Texas State History Museum. Fascinating, interesting, professional, and cool.
Bob Bullock Texas State History Museum
Tomorrow we head for home.
There used to be a 20,000-seat sports/entertainment arena just outside D.C. (not far from where I grew up) named Capital Centre. Like Disneyland, its parking lot was divided into named sections, one being Capitol (with an image of the building). That was probably the only place where both spellings appeared!
Nevada’s Legislature meets biennially, too! And all our Legislators have term limits…we should impose that on the US Congress, too!