{"id":370831,"date":"2026-07-13T04:19:23","date_gmt":"2026-07-13T04:19:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/370831\/"},"modified":"2026-07-13T04:19:23","modified_gmt":"2026-07-13T04:19:23","slug":"random-spooky-cave-situation-is-a-san-antonio-hidden-gem-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/370831\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Random spooky cave situation’ is a San Antonio hidden gem"},"content":{"rendered":"

San Antonio’s River Walk<\/a> is all too familiar for most locals, known for margaritas the size of your forearm, crowds upon crowds of people and no small amount of humidity. But there are plenty of hidden gems to find along this 15-mile stretch of the city once you leave the downtown reach, and one unexpected sight sometimes has visitors doing double-takes.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Walking on the street level near the Pearl <\/a>where Camden Street and Newell Avenue intersect, you may find yourself face-to-face with what looks like the entrance to a cave with the face of a monster (officially, it’s a jaguar, though). It’s more than just a\u00a0“spooky cave situation,”<\/a> as one reddit user calls it \u2014 it’s the Grotto, and once you enter through its toothy maw, a staircase will take you down to the river level where stalactites come down from the ceiling.\u00a0<\/p>\n

According to the San Antonio River Foundation<\/a>, the Grotto is the work of third-generation faux bois (fake wood) artists Carlos Cort\u00e9s. His father anf great uncle brought their faux bois style to San Antonio from Mexico nearly a century ago, the SARF said.\u00a0Another calling sign of\u00a0Cort\u00e9s’ work is the bench you’ll find at street level \u2014 seemingly a wooden palapa with a thatched roof \u2014 carved entirely from concrete. The Grotto features waterfalls, carved-out benches and little easter eggs like fossils carved into the wall and whimsical plants.\u00a0<\/p>\n

When it was built in 2009, it took a dozen full-time workers nine months to complete, according to the SARF. Faces carved into the walls pay homage to the workers who built it, and the tall, oval structure rising above the river and street level is meant to evoke the rays encircling the\u00a0Virgen de Guadalupe seen on most statues. The religious imagery hearkens back to the purpose of grottoes as shrines and places of worship. However, this one mostly serves a place to cool off during a hot summer day.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"San Antonio’s River Walk is all too familiar for most locals, known for margaritas the size of your…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":370790,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[2527,820,82,84,83],"class_list":["post-370831","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-antonio","tag-mysalifestyle","tag-mysastaff","tag-san-antonio","tag-san-antonio-headlines","tag-san-antonio-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/370831","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=370831"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/370831\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/370790"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=370831"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=370831"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=370831"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}