San Antonio

Tiffany found an educator conference in San Antonio, Texas, and convinced me to go, as well, on the district's dime. We have professional development money to spend each contract, and so it didn't cost me anything extra to go. Rachael convinced her boss to let her go, too, which made the trip super fun, getting to go with two dear friends. 

At PDX, while waiting at our gate to board the plane, we got to see some festive llamas, just hanging out, spreading holiday cheer. We arrived in San Antonio that evening and explored the River Walk, which was right next to our hotels downtown. It was beautiful, all strung with Christmas lights. We asked a guy, outside a restaurant we passed, where we should good Texas barbeque for dinner, and he said Pinkerton's. It was a bit of a walk and then a long line to get in, but we made it. They were out of several types of meat and out of the banana pudding I had my eye on, but what we had was very tasty, and we decided we'd give it another try later in the trip. The conference didn't start until noon the next day, so we did more exploring in the morning and took a boat ride tour of the River Walk. It was great! We did encounter a blatantly racist lady in a group of southern tourists. We were shocked and appalled, could hardly believe people still feel that way and are comfortable expressing those views with strangers. Rachael had a great response all ready to go if we ever found ourselves in that situation again. 

The conference itself was fine. Tiffany and I stayed in the hotel where the conference was hosted, and Rachael was just across the street in a different hotel. It worked out well. There were a few good speakers, and a couple so-so sessions, but overall it was an encouraging, uplifting time. We were especially excited to hear Gerry Brooks, a principal on Instagram who posts funny, relatable videos. We came across him down on the River Walk, and he graciously took a photo with us. We were so excited! 

We explored more of San Antonio and visited the cathedral and walked around the Alamo in between sessions. We made it back to Pinkerton's, too, and ordered so much food. We didn't know how to order by the pound and didn't realize how big a beef rib was! The guys cutting and serving the meat thought we were funny and gave us some extra food--pork ribs--for free. They asked if we were going to have time for a nap, because we were going to need it after all that meat. :-) We finished it off, no problem! And the banana pudding was amazing--totally worth going back for a second visit. 

The morning of our last day, before we had to leave for the airport, we made our way to an area called The Pearl in San Antonio, a historic landmark and shopping district build on the grounds of an old brewery. We explored Hotel Emma, the farmers market, some shops, a cute little bookstore, and a fancy grocery store/eatery. It was a great way to end our San Antonio conference trip. 

Our flights home were a little more eventful than we would have liked. Rachael flew through Phoenix and had no trouble getting home. Tiffany and I got delayed on our flight going through Denver beause of a power outage they were having at the airport. At one point, we thought we might be spending the night in Denver, but thankfully, we were able to make our connection and get home that night, just a little later than planned.