Spring Break 2022 - Kind of Staycation

I know it is not really a staycation if you leave your home city, but we were less than two hours away from home. We have been on many trips with D and the Jboys. Our last Spring Break trip with them was in 2017. Our Spring Breaks have not aligned since then. J1 has decided he is too old to join us and J3 did not want to come. 

D, Boogs, J2, J4, and J4's frien J* (yep, he also has a J name) went to an amazing airbnb just outside of San Antonio, Texas. It's a stone cottage built in 1865. It was the perfect place to stay. We had plenty of room, lots of outdoor play space, a firepit, and it was only 17 miles outside of San Antonio. It was on 5 acres of land so the boys had room to roam.

I loved the doors on the house. The electrical wiring had to be hidden behind the wood paneling that drops down from the ceiling because of the stone walls. This house had so much character.

The boys immediately went outside. They threw around a giant frisbee and set up the badminton net.

After we settled into the house, we left and drove to Ingram, Texas to see Stonehenge 2. We thought it would be a fun place to visit. It wasn't. It was just a roadside attraction like stopping and taking a picture with a giant strawberry statue. It was kind of neat for a photo op, but not worth the drive.

I tried to see if I could go through the stone to another time like Claire in the Outlander books. Nope!

There were two Easter Island statues on the grounds. 

We tried to stop by Cascade Caverns on our way back to the Airbnb, but we missed the last tour by 15 minutes. We enjoyed starting a campfire.

                                      

The full moon rising behind the house looked a little creepy.

It was a beautiful night to sit out by the campfire. 

The boys played laser tag in the dark. It was funny watching lights floating around the field while they played.

The boys were happy to head inside and play video games for a while before we all went to sleep.

                                        

D and I played Five Crowns.

The next morning, we had 9 am reservations to see the Alamo in San Antonio.

It was a really cold morning. We had enough time to go to a shop and buy sweatshirts before 9. The boys were much happier when they were warm.

We walked through the Alamo, toured the grounds, read historical markers, and visited the gift shop.

Then we became true tourists. We started in the Mirror Maze and Escape Street. The mirror maze was a lot of fun the first time through.

After you made it through the first time, the staff gave you 3D prism glasses. Boy did that make it hard to see where you were going. J4 tried to run in the maze and slammed right into a mirror with the side of his face. OUCH! 

It was a lot of fun, but the glasses kind of made you sick to your stomach and headachy after a while.

We left the Mirror Maze and went on to Ripley's Believe It Or Not and Louis Tussaud's Waxworks.

Jason Statham and I had a nice conversation. The wax figures really were not that good.

I love Boogs' look of annoyance with J2 in this picture.

The boys liked touring Ripley's better than the wax museum.

It was a fun day. We had a late lunch at Pappasito's Mexican Cantina and then tried to go to Cascade Caverns again. The cavern tours were sold out. So we bought tickets for the first cavern tour the next morning. We had another campfire. The owner of the airbnb, Eddie, joined us for s'mores. He said he had never had one before. Eddie lives in an apartment on top of his workshop at the back of the property. He added to our campfire stories by telling about the time he helped recover a dead body while scuba diving in a lake when he was 12. Luckily, the kids weren't really paying attention. We had s'mores and then the boys played a few more rounds of laser tag followed by video games.

The next morning we finally made it on a tour of Cascade Caverns. Before the tour started, Boogs said he was concerned we were ignoring the signs telling us to stay away from the tour. We had been turned away twice and still insisted on going. Then, just before the tour started, the guide said the tour was overbooked by three people. Boogs yelled out, "It's another sign!"

The tour was about an hour long. It was a neat little tour. Our tour guide was fun and had some great one liners. The only one I remember clearly: Above us you will see formations that are often called soda straws because they are thin, hollow tubes. People say you can drink with them like a straw. In case you are wondering, drinking through one of these soda straws tastes like a third degree felony.

The tri-colored bats were so cute. They are less than two inches long.

After we left the caverns, we headed back home to Austin. The traffic was absolutely horrible. It took almost twice as long to get home as we expected. Boogs and I were supposed to drive to Waco, go to a food truck festival, and then spend the night at Gigi's house. The traffic was so bad, we decided to call an end to our trip. D and the boys picked their cars up from our house and headed to Waco without us. Boogs and I were very tired. We loved the trip but enjoyed having that extra day of rest before returning to work/school. 

As always D, here are our trip sayings to remember:

Nope, Nope, Nope

Mary the ghost in white

Mirror face

Tastes like third degree felony

Stonehenge 2 - eh, we saw it.

This is a safe space... No it isn't!

Laser tag in the dark - NO COVERING

Can't fight the crack

Car back up beep - We are losing him

Mud Hut 1718

Quit embarrassing me, you are acting like you are from California (at Rudy's barbeque)