G-g-g-ghosts?!!!

At least from my own experience, trying to get a standby seat on a direct flight from Newark to Los Angeles is a near impossibility. Out of the previous five times I have been in New Jersey visiting Nicole, I have ended up in the jumpseat five times. . . including one time where I had previously been awarded an economy-plus seat only to have the plane grounded for maintenance just after it pushed from the gate. Anyway, Nicole found herself in New Jersey once again, and knew that I was going to be overnight in San Antonio, Texas. She felt her odds were good if she met me there and then flew with me back to LAX the next day.

The hotel we stay in is well-located on the San Antonio riverwalk, but is apparently haunted. Now, most of the time, such a claim wouldn't faze me, and I have stayed at this hotel multiple times without giving it much thought.

The hotel is over 100 years old and has changed hands a few times, and is now the Sheraton Gunter Hotel. San Antonio itself has a lot of history, so I feel like there is a lot of, "Ah, this place is old, therefore it's haunted!" There are stories of ghosts of Alamo fighters, the spirits of 1920s flappers, and just about everything in between. I consider myself to have a healthy dose of skepticism about such stories, but then I made the mistake of reading the background of why people believe the Gunter is haunted.

Back in the 1960s, some guy checked in to the hotel, brought in a woman of unknown profession, and then murdered her with a knife, butchered her, and tried to dispose of the body by flushing it down the toilet and down the drain of the bathtub. It was the bloodiest, most gruesome murder San Antonio had ever seen. Since then, guests and staff alike have reported seeing a woman roaming the halls and other strange happenings.

This all took place in room 636, and I recounted this story to Nicole before she arrived so that she could mentally prepare herself for all kinds of paranormal activities. Room 636 was her first destination upon arrival at the hotel. She reported back that she saw, felt, or heard nothing. Phew. I don't need any ghosts following me back to my room. Nobody has time for that. I can't sleep with someone watching me.

Miraculously we made it through the night and the only thing that disturbed my sleep was a very noisy air-conditioning unit that kept going on and off. Ghosts? º_º

When we woke up, we sought out some breakfast. It must be the end of tourist season because the riverwalk was absolutely desolate. Ghosts? We ended up eating breakfast at La Panaderia, and spent a few minutes looking at the numerous selections of fancy baked goods.

I settled on a cheesecake-flavored pastry as well as this key-lime cruffin. What is a cruffin you ask? Why it is a hybrid croissant-muffin. The worker behind the counter described it as "stupidly good." I feel like that is a fairly accurate assessment. It is an item that shouldn't even exist, yet it was delightful.

Afterward, we strolled along the river, and although the central area of the riverwalk was quite empty itself, we wandered away from the restaurants and bars to find a calmer, quieter portion to walk along. It was very relaxing and a nice change of pace from the times I have been here and frustratingly wondered how many people get pushed into the river every day.

After reversing our course on the opposite side of the river, we walked up to the Alamo to find some shade in the courtyard under a pecan tree. Some birds had decided that they also liked the pecan tree and kept pecking at the branches. Every few seconds, a nut would come crashing down nearby. We felt it was only a matter of time before one hit us on the head, yet miraculously it never happened. Ghosts?

Nicole bought a souvenir pin in the shape of a bottle of BBQ sauce from the Alamo gift shop, then we walked back to the haunted Gunter Hotel.

All in all, I think we made it out of there without being followed, but who can know for sure?

When Nicole tried to check in for her flight online, it said there was no record of the booking or that perhaps she had booked a paper ticket. Paper tickets? What is this 1992? Strange happenings, indeed.

San Antonio for "Spring Break"

I'm a few days late in posting this, but I am ... what's the word . . . ah yes, lazy. Anyway, I once again had an overnight in San Antonio for the first time in a while. Unlike my previous visit in December, it was not cold and rainy. In fact, it was quite pleasant with temperatures in the 80s.

As a crew, we went out for food and beverage. It was nice to be able to sit outside and relax a bit. This was in stark contrast to my previous visit where I was attempting to blow warm air onto my hands to keep them from freezing.

Now the unfortunate downside to this improvement of weather, further exacerbated by the time of year which coincides with many a spring break, there were a lot of people. This made for a lot of slow walking behind people who were lost/drunk/annoying/choosing to walk 6 abreast/oblivious.

I was devilishly thinking to myself about how easy it would be to start pushing people into the river. How many people fall in during a day? I think 17.

One of my greatest pet peeves in life is slow walkers. It's right up there with people who stand real close to me in a line, and people who take longer than 15 seconds to drive away from a parking spot after getting into their car. Maybe I'm not good with people.

When the crew all returned to their rooms, I ventured out for what I hoped would be a relaxing stroll around the river walk. It was still wall-to-wall (or river to restaurant) people. I eventually had to go up some steps and walk on surface streets because the slow walkers and abrupt stoppers were driving me bats (which were also getting in my way, particularly below bridges.)

It's kind of a catch-22 for someone like myself. When the weather's good, the people come out and ruin the atmosphere. As a result, Nicole and I have been forced to travel in off seasons. London in February. Peru in the rainy season. And I can't believe I'm saying this, but maybe San Antonio on a rainy December's day was more photogenic and enjoyable.

Remember the Alamo! . . . and a raincoat

Today marked my first overnight in San Antonio since I began working for the airlines. It's somewhat surprising that it took this long, and it's also unfortunate that just a few days ago it was 70 degrees and sunny here. For my visit, it would rain all day and peak at about 43 degrees. I guess I've been lucky with my other recent trips, so I tried not to let the weather get me down and ventured out into the muck with my good camera in hopes of capturing the Christmas lights that line the riverwalk.

I first went to the Alamo just before sunset except there was no sunset because the sky was completely overcast. There was a big xmas tree in front if the Alamo and I tried to use the rain puddles and capture some reflections to justify going out on this cold, rainy evening. The dampness was bone-chilling and I spent some time in the gift shop warming up before venturing out once more.

I experimented with some digital ND filters I got for my camera to varying degrees of success. The sky wasn't dark enough for a slow shutter photo, so I tried to use a graded filter to fix that and you can see the result here. As you can see, the sky kind of abruptly changes color here, so I have to keep practicing, but it's good to know they actually work and it's not just a Sony gimmick. I hope you appreciated my photographic nerdiness.

Next I walked along the riverwalk and although the cold rain was pretty miserable, it was almost relaxing because nobody was out in this normally bustling tourist area. No one sat at the outdoor restaurants or bars. Wait staff looked quite bored. I could take my time with setting up my mini-tripod to get some long exposures without feeling like I was getting in anyone's way. After a bit, I started losing feeling in my right thumb, so manipulating the control became increasingly difficult.

After getting a few more shots, I went to Potbelly's for a sandwich and a cookie and returned to the hotel where I attempted to dry and thaw for the remainder of the evening.

Playing Cricket in San Antonio

As I met Nicole at the Culver City Which-Wich during her lunch break on Friday, the people around us must have been confused. "Well we can get to San José, but we can't get back." "Phoenix is a no go. Overbooked." "Everyone's going to Las Vegas this weekend, so that's out." "Hotels in Monterey are too expensive." In the end, I pulled up a map on my computer and for some reason my eye was drawn to San Antonio. Seats available? Many. Hotels? Cheap enough. Alamo? Remembered.

We arrived Saturday around 2:30pm -- an awkward time for my always hungry belly. We had a late lunch / early dinner at a place called Esquire Tavern. We ate outside on the balcony on the famous riverwalk. The location was quiet and calm, elevated above the crowds of tourists below. That was one thing that became a bit stressful about this touristy part of town. The riverwalk sidewalks are not particularly wide whereas the people walking on them are. People would often stop in the middle as if to contemplate where they were going. Nicole speculates that on any given night, there are 100 people who fall into the river.

In the evening, we spent a little while watching a free concert along the river. Eventually two bold middle-aged women got up to dance and spin around. I think Nicole was hoping that they would eventually fall into the river. Sometimes we can be like the two old guys on the muppets. After a few songs, we continued on our way along the riverwalk. Earlier I had seen lights strung from trees and hanging from above. I thought it would be quite a sight at night, but none of them were illuminated. Shortly thereafter I discovered why.

Nicole was performing what appeared to be a new type of honky tonk, slapping leather, heel/toe jump kick move followed by some spastic boot scootin' boogie, but I then realized she was trying to avoid stepping on crickets. And there were easily over 100 on the small area of sidewalk in front of us. When we got back to our hotel, the neighbors next door were talking loudly, whistling, and just generally being obnoxious. To make matters worse, I found a cricket in our room. I trapped it in a styrofoam cup and dumped it humanely outside. 5 mins later I found another one. As the neighbors continued to whistle, I coaxed the cricket under the door that connected our two rooms. 20 seconds later I heard a shriek of, "Ack!!! It's another one!!!!!" We didn't hear anything from our neighbors the rest of the night. I guess the crickets got them. *Moment of silence* The third and final cricket was spotted brushing its teeth using my toothbrush. I hit it with a towel, scooped it up with a cup, and threw it over the balcony. Apparently this is common in Central Texas this time of year when crickets become horny and just swarm.

As daylight came, the crickets disappeared. In fact, the tourist crowds were gone as well. After a breakfast of chorizo tacos, we enjoyed a tourist-free walk around the riverwalk. I had a banana split for lunch and readied myself to go back to LA. All in all, a relatively easy trip. No need to even rent a car. I can't really think of anything else we would have done in San Antonio. We all learned a valuable lesson, though. Stay away from the bright lights at night...and remember the Alamo.