Marc's Public Blog

2024/04/11 San Antonio Missions National Park: San Juan, San José, and Mission Conception

π 2024-04-11 01:01 in Monuments, Museums

The national park is a set of 3 old Spanish Missions, and was interesting enough, to visit:

Seeing a small still working aqueduc was cool:

And here is the 3rd mission:

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2024/04/11 San Antonio Museum of Art

π 2024-04-11 01:01 in Museums

The San Antonio Museum of Art had a nice little collection, worth visiting for a couple of hours or so:

this is the way :)

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2024/04/10 Hopscotch San Antonio

π 2024-04-10 01:01 in Museums

Hopscotch in San Antonio was a fun place to visit, although you could only pay on your phone through some website, even if you were right there, plus they had a ridiculous waiver that was more pages than anyone could read, and that you were forced to read on your phone, and sign on your phone, before you were allowed in. That really dampened the place for me, which is a bummer as it was otherwise fun:

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2024/04/09 Austin Bob Bullock State History Museum

π 2024-04-09 01:01 in Museums

Austin Bob Bullock State History Museum was a decent museum in Austin, where I learned about how the state became a state, starting from when it was taken over by the Mexicans, there was even a French expedition that tried, but didn't get very far (they all died in the end):

remnants of the french boat expedition

maps were still in flux

Frst the mexicans living in Texas kind of wanted independence from Mexico, and then the americans who came to help take care of the land, decided to get independence from the Mexicans:

Plenty of other displays on interesting things that happened in Texas:

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2024/02/28 Chapultepec Castle in Mexico City

π 2024-02-28 01:01 in Mexico, Monuments, Museums

Chapultepec Castle is an interesting historical castle built in Mexico City, originally by the Spanish, and then it was taken by the French which brought a lot of cool things to it, including even some exquisite stained glass made in Paris.
It's pretty far out of the way, a 1h uber ride from town center with rush hour traffic and then It's a bit of a long walk through a park and then uphill from the street (plan an extra 20mn), and google says it can be very busy with long lines, but it was fine the morning I went (early morning is best)

Nice views from the hill:

Had to go through 2 lawyers of security that do not even allow water in. That was non ideal... Eventually got there though, and we paid a private guide who gave us a 1h tour:

the stained glass, shipped all the way from Paris by boat and re-assembled, looked wonderful

I looked up the address in Paris, of course that was over 100 years ago ;)

After the castle, it was another walk through the park to another exit and got to see many vendors, to go to the excellent archeological museum across the street (but still a long walk):

nice insomniac looking owl ;)

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2024/02/28 Mexico City's National Antropological Museum

π 2024-02-28 01:01 in Mexico, Museums

The last thing I had time for, was the National Antropological Museum, pretty close to Chapultepec Castle, and it was a very impressive and pretty complete museum on the history of the land and civilizations, going back thousands of years. Unfortunately I didn't navigate in the correct order, so the history was somewhat backwards, but nonetheless the place was super interesting.

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2024/02/23 Mexico City's Templo Mayor Museum

π 2024-02-23 01:01 in Mexico, Museums

Mexico has a rich history from the Mayans and other first nations, and they built really impressive temples for the times. Unfortunately there is very little left of the really cool one in Mexico City, but the ruins and museum in its place were still quite interesting to visit.
This is what it used to look like: