It was my intention to write this shortly after our mini camping/pilgrimage trip to San Antonio but obviously that didn’t happen so here we are over a month later. We have been a bit busy with our business and I’ve been a little busy with helping my sister with her upcoming wedding and planning the bridal shower/bachelorette party. Yay for matron of honor duties, haha. But for real, it’s fun but it’s been busy.
We have gone to the San Antonio Pilgrimage many times in the past and decided to do it again this year. It’s just something we like to do with fellow traditional Catholics to show our love of the Catholic Faith. Plus, we have been talking about camping with the kids so this was a way that we could introduce them to sleeping in a tent for just one night before making a full blown camping trip (hopefully) later this year.
For a little bit of info on the Pilgrimage itself and info about the SSPX that is responsible for putting on events like these and for providing us with the Latin Mass, feel free to visit HERE! Like Father said in the sermon before the start of the pilgrimage on Saturday, May 18th, we walk a 8+ mile pilgrimage to four of the remaining five (the last mission is the Alamo) of the San Antonio Mission Chapels for many different reasons. It’s a way for Catholics to publicly show our love for Catholicism and Tradition, to show honor to those who went before us and blazed the mission trail (specifically the Franciscan friars who founded the settlement of San Antonio in the early 18th century), and it’s also a great way to make reparation for the sins committed against the Immaculate and Sacred Heart. After all, walking that many miles in the Texas heat in the middle of May is not exactly refreshing, haha.
We started what ended up being a 4+ hour drive to San Antonio from Houston at around 3pm on the Friday before the Pilgrimage with my brother and a friend. Carpooling makes things much easier! Thank goodness for in-laws who let us borrow their big SUV so we can fit all of our camping stuff as well! Of course, we had to stop at Buc-ee’s on the way there so that extended our travel time a bit. P.S. If you aren’t from Texas and have never visited a Buc-ee’s store, you definitely should at some point in your life because it’s an awesome gas station & convenience store, unlike anything you can find in other states. But I’m probably a bit biased, haha.
Traffic wasn’t the best and after some misdirection from the person in charge of finding a place to eat dinner, we ended up just stopping at a hole in the wall Italian place around 7. That restaurant was amazing btw with live Italian music and delicious food! I think it ended up being almost 9pm before we finally made it to the local church where we would be setting up our tents and staying the night.
Thank goodness St. Joseph’s Catholic Church (the church which organized the whole pilgrimage_ also allows people to stay on their property for free if they want to camp. That definitely makes it easier for us to have a budget-friendly trip. We were expecting rain that night too so we were also fortunate that they would allow us to go inside the hall or church if we needed better protection from the storm.
My brother and the girls helping set up one of the tents. 
Not a great picture, but at least they were sleeping!
We set up our 4 person tent with just a foam mattress topper and some sleeping bags for our family including my husband and I, the 4 year old, 2 year old, and 1 year old. It was super simple since we didn’t have all kinds of things to unload since we were only staying one night. Plus, we had access to the church’s bathroom if needed. It did end up raining that night and got a little windy which resulted in some of the rain being blown inside the tent but the kids still slept decently. It was hot and humid though and we didn’t have much of a breeze since the rain cover was on so I barely got any sleep but hey, we all survived, haha. The kids still loved camping and if you don’t tell them they that’s it’s hot then they don’t usually notice the difference.
The next morning, we packed up the tent shortly after we woke up so we could have the car packed and ready to go to the first mission after Mass and breakfast at the church. I didn’t know what type of breakfast they were going to provide, so I did make breakfast burritos in advance and froze them to have Saturday morning and along the walk if needed. This always helps us save money since we don’t have to stop anywhere for expensive breakfast.
The kids love finding snails and bugs so while we were waiting for people to arrive at Mission Concepcion, they found these interesting looking snails or whatever they are. 
Mission Concepcion 
And of course picking flowers along the way… 
Fun frugal fact: I went to Walmart the day before the pilgrimage to find the kids some hats to wear but they only had ugly cartoon character hats. I went to Goodwill and was able to find them some hats for under $2 each instead of $5 each at Walmart. I always love a good deal! 
The wildflowers along the trail made the walk even more beautiful.
Parishioners from the local church in San Antonio, as well as many from our chapel( Queen of Angels in Dickinson, Texas) all met at Mission Concepcion to walk the pilgrimage together. Basically, it was a day of walking and singing the pilgrimage version of the rosary in Latin in addition to other hymns to and from each mission chapel, with a break and a few prayers said at each mission. We started at Mission Concepcion, then walked to Mission San Jose where we had a break for lunch (after which it started raining!), and then finished by walking to Mission San Juan. A few people(such as those in my group) also finished the pilgrimage by walking the last few miles to Mission Espada, but for some reason our whole group of 100 plus people did not. This was possibly because they had a wedding going on at Mission Espada so we couldn’t go inside the chapel, but honestly I don’t know the reason.
Thank goodness for a husband and brother who pushed the strollers so I rarely needed to. 
Yes, we did in fact bring both of our strollers. We wanted a backup in case Genevieve (the 4 year old) wanted to rest from walking and it also ended up working perfectly to carry our lunchbox, umbrella, and water bottles.
All in all I think it ended up being close to 9 miles for those who walked the first 3 missions, but closer to 12 miles for those who walked to the last mission. It’s probably nothing compared to the hundred mile pilgrimages in Europe where you walk over 20 mile a day but it was good enough for us, ha!
Mission San Jose 
Mission San Juan 
Along the mission trail.
It was a great experience, as it always is, to do something like this with fellow Catholics who have the same beliefs, values, and goals as you do. I always love seeing historical buildings and thinking about all the history that happened inside the walls so many years ago. We were also fortunate that it actually didn’t end up being too hot and it even rained for a few minutes during the walk which cooled everyone down. It even ended early compared to past years and by 2pm, we were back in the car and on our way to an early dinner and then ready to make the drive home. The day went by so fast but I think everyone was exhausted anyway so we were glad to be able to get on our way home before it got too late in the day.
We found another off the beaten path BBQ restaurant at a local private airport for an early dinner before we headed home. 
The kids loved watching the airplanes fly off from up close.
It was an awesome short camping trip/getaway to San Antonio and we look forward to doing it again next year. Maybe we will be able to camp at a local park for a few days before hand to make it more of a camping trip for the kids as well. But then again we didn’t have much notice for this trip so it kind of snuck up on us. Maybe we will be more prepared next year to actually plan things more than a few weeks in advance. We shall see!
If anyone is interested in learning more about Catholic pilgrimages or the missions, let me know. I’m not sure I would really be able to help much but I can try!
