Public Transit for a Better Vacation

T and I just got back from a week's vacation in San Antonio, TX, where we got some much needed rest and sun. 

We've got a pattern going where our first day in a new place we get on one of those hop-on hop-off tour busses. It allows us to get the lay of the land, get a little bit of narration, and get transportation to one or more of the notable spots. While it could be a bit too "touristy" for some folks, we've found it fairly economical, and a good way to get oriented with the major highlights.

After the first day, however, we tend to strike out more on our own. At one of the shops we stopped at, the store owner told us about a special bus route, called the "culture line", which would take us by a lot of the major attractions such as the art museum and botanical gardens. So we hop on the Via (San Antonio's bus service) website, only to discover that the specialty lines have been paused since COVID, but that the standard city busses will work well for us.

I was super impressed with the modern tech for navigating ticketing and the routes. They have an easy app to purchase and store your ticket, and you simply show the QR code to the driver to ride. For trip planning, you have a bunch of choices: 1) there's another app, 2) they are fully integrated with Google maps, 3) from any bus stop, you can text the bus stop number and get back a list of all the busses and their next 2 arrival times. 

We chose the weekly option, and at $12 each, it paid for itself on the first day. We headed to the botonical gardens, which would have been $12 + tip each way if we used Uber. (And this was our reward, for the short 8 minute walk from the bus stop to the gardens.)

We did similar trips throughout the week to restaurants or attractions, saving a total of about $96 vs Uber (and twice that vs Lyft). Take all those savings and do an extra river boat ride and order dessert every night!

Other benefits, of course, are vs cars, you are making the more eco-friendly option. Vs walking, you get a break for your feet and get to expand your radius of exploration. And finally, you tend to take more local streets vs highways and get to see more of the town. There were at least a few sights and restaurants we discovered because of travelling a different route or being dropped off on the opposite side of our destination.