Best buckin’ rodeo in Texas

It has been 6 longs months since we’ve been on vacation, and decided it was definitely time to go.   After much investigation we decided on San Antonio, Texas.  We booked our flight with Northwest from Detroit ($331.16 USD).  We left Kitchener around 7:15am and had a very long drive to Windsor.  Highway 401 between Kitchener and Windsor is the most boring stretch of road I’ve ever driven on.  We made a quick stop at the Columbia Sportswear outlet store to see if there were any deals.  Karen was looking for a spring jacket but I’m the one that ended up coming out with a huge bag of coats for my family.  We crossed the Ambassador Bridge and had to wait approximately 20 minutes to clear customs.  We left the car at US Park near the Detroit Metro Airport and had a quick shuttle ride to the terminal.

While waiting to board the plane, they announced that the flight was over-booked and that they were looking for volunteers to take a later flight + coupon for dinner + $300 travel voucher.  Karen quickly put us on the waiting list of volunteers.  I prayed and I prayed but unfortunately for us, they didn’t need our seats.

We got on the plane and spent the next 3-1/2 hours trying to listen to the gentleman behind us, who was from San Antonio.  He was giving the couple seated next to him, tons of tips about San Antonio.  Anytime that he said something interesting, Karen wrote it down.  Once we landed in San Antonio, we picked up our bags and headed over to Hertz ($204.99 USD) to get our car.  Our home for the next week is the Staybridge Suites ($109.99 USD).  We checked in and then I went next door to Texas Land & Cattle Steak House to get a yummy snack of nachos and cheese and steak, to hold us over until dinner.

Karen found on the internet that there is a rodeo on Saturday nights in Bulverde, Texas … the Tejas Rodeo.  It took us about ½ hour to get there and once we arrived, we knew we were in for a fun evening.  As we were walking in, 140 members of the Milwaukee Luthern High School Band were entertaining the crowd.  We noticed that many people had plates of BBQ that looked awesome. We made our way to the Cibolo Smokehouse and Saloon to get some dinner.  OH MY GOD … best brisket I’ve ever had.  For only $7.50 you could choose 1 meat (chicken, brisket or sausage), and 2 sides (cream corn, pinto beans, green beans, potato salad).  The meat was BBQ’d on a huge smoker outside and you could smell the BBQ everywhere.

After dinner we went to the grandstand to get some seats.  The rodeo included bull riding, tie-down calf and team roping, barrel racing, break-away roping and a calf scramble.  Calf scramble is for kids age 12 and under.  They played a game with the rodeo clown that involved rolling around in the dirt!  Followed by chasing four calves around the arena, that had orange ribbons tied to their tails.  The goal was to get the ribbon off the calves’ tails.  It was a hoot to watch, although I don’t know what the kids with the ribbons actually won.   The rodeo was followed by a dance in the courtyard area, with a live band playing.

After a tiring day, we headed back to our hotel.

One Comment

  1. Darlene
    March 30, 2008

    I knew there would be pictures of the food !!! Looking forward to pics of you two tomorrow.

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