Feliz Navidad in San Antonio

 
Hi Kids,
This is me on a bridge overlooking the San Antonio River
in San Antonio, Texas   The river goes right through
downtown and the city has created a lovely river walk
beside it.  The banks are lined with trees and there are lots of shops, hotels and restaurants on both sides.  Below you can see one of the restaurants through one of the many bridges which cross the river.

There are over 200 trees, many very old, along the walks.  At Christmas they are beautifully
 decorated with over 126,000 lights.  Barge rides on the river are very popular. 

 One night our group had dinner on a barge.  You can see a little of the ride in this video.  The food was great and the weather was wonderful.  Miss Elaine only had to wear a sweater -- and she's always complaining that she's cold.  Not this night.  And, of course, Emily and I had our own fur coats!

Another night, Emily and I took a helicopter ride over the city to see the lights.  Sometimes Emily takes my picture and sometimes I take hers.  We thought these little bears were cute in their flying outfits.  We didn't have to wear goggles, but we did have to wear headsets so we could hear the pilot talking to us.

The lights of the city were beautiful -- but the helicopter was jiggly so the photo isn't exactly in focus -- but you get the idea.

 

This is Miss Elaine and me after our ride.  The picture isn't great -- Emily needs to practice her photo skills!

 Texas was originally a part of Mexico and the 
Mexican heritage is still very strong here.  This is our favorite Mexican restaurant in San Antonio.  It's called Mi Tierra and it was really decorated for Christmas.  It's always colorful -- but it was even sparklier than usual this time!

Although tamales are eaten year 'round, they are a big part of a Mexican Christmas celebration.  It takes a long time to make tamales because you have to cook the beans or meat filling ahead of time and soak the corn husks that you wrap the tamales in so that they will be soft and won't split.  Then you have to mix the masa (cornmeal) to make a dough.  You spread the dough on the corn husk, add the filling, then roll the whole thing up.  After that you steam the tamales until they are done.  We got to take a cooking lesson in tamale making.  This is me mixing the dough.

                    And this is me getting ready to unwrap the corn husks and eat the tamales!
 

 Another Mexican tradition is the presentation of the play "Los Pastores," which means "The Shepherds.  This video shows the very beginning of the play.  It is done in Spanish, but we had an interpreter.  The play is very, very old.  It tells the story of the journey of the shepherds to Bethlehem.  It is a folk play, so it has some adventures that have been added to the traditional story make it more interesting.  There's even a sword fight!

 We ended our visit to San Antonio with a day at Six Flags Fiesta Texas.  We saw the Looney Tunes Christmas Show.  It even snowed!  Miss Elaine wound up with globs of "snow" on her head and even on her camera.  It wasn't real snow -- I think it was soapsuds!

 
 The park had lots of decorations and even Santa's Castle.  There were scenes of Santa's workshop inside -- something to look at while standing in line waiting to see Santa.

 We took Santa's picture with a little visitor.  Emily and I didn't get too close to Santa.  We were afraid he would think we were toys and would stuff us in his sack!  We had a great time.

 Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays, kids!  Have a great vacation.    When you come back, we'll have another story for you about my visit to Fredericksburg, Texas.
Love,
Emily and Tiger

Bear-y Scary Times

Hi Kids,

I can't believe it's been a month since I've blogged. Time flies and soon school will be out! I've been on another trip but I haven't finished telling you about my last one yet! So here's a little more about my San Antonio trip.

At the top of this post is Miss Eva from the San Antonio Convention and Visitors' Bureau with me. She sent each of you a pencil -- which Miss Elaine needs to bring you!

This is me with Chef Donald Hoffman. We had breakfast with him at the Marriott Rivercenter Hotel. He gave us some of his special seasoned salt -- yum.

This is Miss Elaine and Chef Rudy at the Culinary Institute of America. We were learning how to make some dishes that people might have eaten in Texas many years ago. And they still like it now. Miss Elaine is making a salsa verde -- that's Spanish for green sauce -- using a stone molcajete to crush the tomatillos. Next time she'll use a blender!

And this is me in my chef's toque. They let me wear it but they wouldn't let me cook!

One of the best things we did was go to Sea World. And do you know who else was there? Jungle Jack Hanna was there and he brought lots of animals with him. He REALLY liked me!

This was the scary part. We went to his dressing room after his show and he had two cheetahs running loose. Their names are Bella and Jacob and they are five months old. They looked like big kitties. I got in Miss Elaine's bag. I didn't want them to think I was a play toy!

Then we went to the Shamu show. That wasn't scary -- just a little wet when the whale hit the water!

Love,

Fluffy

Cruisin' Down the River

Hi Kids,

Well, I've been on the road again -- finally! Miss Elaine and I left last Thursday for San Antonio, Texas. And it wasn't easy. We left early for the airport and got there only to find out that our plane was indefinitely delayed. BUT there was another flight leaving in only ten minutes. We ran to the gate and were able to get on that plane. We felt so smart! Then we sat on the tarmac, and sat, and sat. Finally, the pilot's voice came over the intercom, "Sorry, folks, we can't take off because the Houston airport is shut down because of fog." We had to fly to Houston to get to San Antonio. Look at the map -- this doesn't make any sense! But that's the way the airline routed us.

We finally took off, arriving in Houston three minutes after our connecting flight left. Because the airport had been shut down, all the flights were messed up. We couldn't get another flight to San Antonio -- all the seats on all the flights were filled for the rest of the day.

We didn't know what we were going to do until the people picking us up at the San Antonio airport called and said, If you can get on a flight to Austin, we'll drive there and pick you up." And that's what we did. After we got to Austin, it was a little over an hour's drive to San Antonio. We got there just in time to join our group for a relaxing dinner cruise on the San Antonio River.

At the top, that's me with the captains of our two boats. The San Antonio River used to be a big muddy ditch which occasionally flooded. Back in the 40s (I think) the city put in flood control dams and made the river beautiful. Now it competes with the Alamo as the number one attraction in San Antonio. And it inspired people in Oklahoma City to build the Bricktown Canal.

This is a picture of our boat as we boarded. We started our dinner with a spinach salad. We also had salmon (I bet they knew that bears love salmon), rice and broccoli. For dessert there was a big piece of chocolate cake. I was very careful not to get any frosting on my fur!

Here's some video Miss Elaine took from the boat. You can see the pretty lights and all the people on the sides of the river walking or eating. It is a very lively place with lots of restaurants and shops. You can also hear the captain telling us about the sights along the river.

Love,

Fluffy