The Riverwalk Saga

On a whim, we decided to drive down to San Antonio to see my friend’s new house. He’s been bugging me to come see it for months now, so I figured it was time. And since it was a holiday weekend, it meant we could go down Saturday, come back Sunday, and still have Monday to relax. The plan was to get there in early afternoon, see their house, and then head to the Riverwalk for dinner. And then afterward, we’d ride the river boat, so Troy could enjoy that. With that plan, I booked a hotel right on the Riverwalk, so we could walk instead of having to find a place to park, and so we’d be closer after our Riverwalk excursion.

We headed out Saturday as planned, but along the way our plans got derailed. Not only did we make several unplanned pit stops, but we also blew out a tire. By the time we got the spare on, almost every place was closed. And as we were soon to find out, they were closed on Sundays as well, and being a holiday, on Monday too! The places that we did find open didn’t carry the specialty tires for my wife’s car. We drove to every tire shop we could find for the next two hours with no luck. We were ready to give up when my wife decided to pull into a Midas tire center. I told her that they were closed, but she insisted that we try because the bay doors were open.

At first, one of the guys met us at the doors and told us that they were closed, but after my wife broke down in tears telling her story, they let us in. They didn’t have the exact tire that we needed, but they had one that was similar. Unfortunately, after getting it on the rim, we discovered that the tread was separating from the tire. So, we were back to square one, but still sending kudos to the guys at Midas for trying to help us when so many others had turned us away.

It was getting dark, so we decided to head on to my friend’s house and try again in the morning. After the traumatic and emotional day, we decided to forego the Riverwalk and eat somewhere close. When we arrived at our hotel, it was late. Also, we found out that Labor Day weekend is a popular time in San Antonio for anime conventions and concerts. Which translates to zero parking. We ended up having to pay for valet just to park in the hotel’s garage.

The room at the Hotel Contessa was nice, but they somehow screwed up our booking, and we ended up with one king bed instead of two queens. So, Troy and my wife shared the bed, while I took the couch. By the time we crashed, it didn’t really matter…it was enclosed and cozy…with a picture of a bull on the wall.

The next morning, we decided to have breakfast on the Riverwalk to salvage some small sliver of the trip. While we got ready, I managed to find a couple of tire shops that were open. Nobody had our exact tires, but taking a page from the guys at Midas, we asked about tires near in size. We found one Goodyear tire shop that carried the bigger tires. We decided that was better than driving home in the spare, so we made an appointment and went to grab breakfast.

The weather was unusually beautiful and the walk along the river was very nice. It was a shame that we didn’t have more time to enjoy it. We ate at a very popular German restaurant, which turned out to be very good. Unfortunately, we didn’t have enough time to ride the boats, so after a brisk walk back, we headed to the tire shop.

We opted for two tires instead of one, to attempt to save the alignment. And it took them two hours to change them, for some reason, even though there was only one other car at the shop. So, it was after two o’clock before we got on the road to Dallas. The drive back was uneventful, except for the weird thunderstorms that we drove through as we hit the edge of town. On the positive side God took care of us in our time of need. On the negative side, nothing went as planned this weekend.