Liza K.
Yelp
This place was hell. We arrive and we're redirected to some empty lot that acted as a portal to a hot desert. We were told there would be shuttles, but the line was so long, people may have given up all hope for humanity and left. I wanted to run away, but I had a BF who is obsessed with all things Texas. The wait was around 2 hours. Two hours. Just use that number and think complex algebra and pre cal formulas. Remember how much you hated that in high school? Now imagine doing that under the hot sun in the middle of nowhere.
We arrive. There's a reenactment of the San Jacinto battle and we were seated near the Mexican as opposed to the Texan side. It didn't matter which side you watched, it was all long and awful, because there was a delay and then the narrator would pause for 5-15 minutes. The best part was probably when the props backfired on one actor as the gun powder blew up in his face, so he did his best and pretended a Texan killed him. Sometimes the canons went off at odd intervals and were louder than expected, which would cause the actors to break and show their surprise, before they remembered they were pretending to lose part of Mexico to those awful Texians.
Remember, this was under the hot sun. Hot blistering sun. With a long delay. And a narrator who decided it was great to test the limits of skin cancer as he paused. Once the Sam Houston character got on a buggie to leave, I felt the same. I was cooked, miserable, and there wasn't enough water at the time to make me happy. We saw a museum, elevator ride, and movie. The movie was probably my favorite part, because of the weird facts I learned, like Stephen F. Austin wanted to be called Esteban at one point.
Museum closes early on us, even though we paid our tickets- BF fights to keep it open. When we left I was miserable and in pain; there was another 1-2 hour wait for the shuttle. Water was finally given out and employees were yelling, "We'll do better next year." At that point I lost all my cool, sat down outside under a tent for vendors and refused to stand until it was a short manageable line. Vendors went home early and all the people stuck there probably didn't even get dinner. Hot, miserable, and poorly organized. This was what Santa Anna felt that day. I wish I could say I'm not coming back next year, but I love the BF and he wants to try to come again, but on a different significant Texan date with less people. If there's news of a woman next year who died of anger and heat exhaustion, it was probably me.