If you know something about Texas history, it probably has to do with The Alamo and the Texan’s fight for independence. Far fewer people know however, there are several other Spanish missions inside the San Antonio city limits. The first one I visited was Mission San Juan Capistrano.
The Spanish missions in Texas were designed with different objectives compared with their Californian counterparts. In California, missions were placed a one days walk apart so travelers would have somewhere to sleep at night. In Texas, the five missions in the south of San Antonio are only about 3 miles apart and are placed that way because they served as a place of protection for the local inhabitants from raiding Indians. As the case with most of the missions in this area, most of the walls have been destroyed, however now it is part of the National Park System and is well kept. If you would like more information, visit the NPS website. http://www.nps.gov/saan/planyourvisit/sanjuan.htm