The Best Places to Drink and Stay in South of Southtown & around

Iron four-poster beds and colonial furnishings fill a building that was, not so long ago, a saddlery. The Mokara is a boutique hotel on the River Walk with a Forbes Four Star rating, a rooftop pool overlooking the water, and a spa serious enough to count as a destination on its own. Ostra, the in-house restaurant, leans into international seafood. A compact, well-appointed stay for people who find the big chain hotels depressing.

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Four Star
2. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

1. Eater The Best Cocktail Bars in San Antonio
2. San Antonio Current The 50 best bars in San Antonio

Portraits of historical drunkards and ne'er-do-wells line the walls of this downtown cocktail bar, which sets the tone pretty efficiently. Long shared tables give the room a public-hall looseness, and the menu swings wide, pairing gin martinis and oysters with po'boys and tropical painkillers. The occasional burlesque night confirms that nobody here is pretending this is a quiet spot for serious reflection.

1. Eater The Best Cocktail Bars in San Antonio
2. San Antonio Current The 50 best bars in San Antonio

The cocktail menu here tracks Mexico's geography and history the way a graduate thesis might, except the drinks are good enough that you don't feel lectured. This compact Southtown cocktail bar rotates its program in chapters, currently deep in the years before Mexican independence from Spain. Mezcal meets manzanilla and poblano in one glass; spruce tip and tomatillo air appear in another. The minimal room handles both serious contemplation and a fun night out.

1. Eater The Best Cocktail Bars in San Antonio
2. San Antonio Current @ Bar Mixtli · The 50 best bars in San Antonio

1. Eater The Best Cocktail Bars in San Antonio
2. San Antonio Current The 50 best bars in San Antonio
3. San Antonio Express-News #8 · Top 10 San Antonio River Walk Restaurants

The cellar bar has been a notorious local nightspot for longer than anyone will admit, which tells you something about the Hotel Havana's bones. This boutique hotel on the Riverwalk keeps its century-old structure intact and layers on a pre-Castro Cuban romance that feels lived-in rather than themed. Rooms start compact but climb quickly toward something genuinely plush. A Michelin Selected Hotel, and one with actual character to justify the billing.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

A river taxi pulls up right to the front door, which tells you something about where this hotel sits on the San Antonio Riverwalk. Rooms run to walnut paneling, teal accents, and gold hardware, with the Presidential Suite adding a marble dining table and floor-to-ceiling city views for anyone who needs convincing. The rooftop pool has a tiki bar, Cavalier does upscale American brasserie downstairs, and the Convention Center crowd is a short walk away.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

Eight stone-walled suites with freestanding tubs occupy what was once a 19th-century schoolhouse dedicated to Friedrich Schiller, which is either poetic or a little on the nose. This 347-room boutique hotel blends that preserved historic shell with a tower that layers Bauhaus and Spanish colonial details in together. Ten floors up, the open-air Tenfold rooftop bar has unobstructed views over downtown San Antonio, which does a lot of the selling all by itself.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

Three 19th-century buildings on the National Register of Historic Places anchor this 253-room hotel spread across four and a half garden acres between Downtown and Southtown. The River Walk is a short walk, but the shaded pathways, big pool, and the Anaqua Garden Bar tucked under the trees make leaving feel optional. A daily tea ceremony under an ancient anaqua tree is the kind of quiet ritual guests mention long after checkout.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

Rugged wood, leather, and stone textures run through the modernist interiors here, giving the Thompson brand's mid-century aesthetic a quietly Texan edge. This sleek hotel towers above the River Walk, which means the city's restaurants, bars, and shops are essentially at the front door. It's a Hyatt property now, but the design identity has held. The Michelin Guide lists it among its selected hotels.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

1. Eater The Best Cocktail Bars in San Antonio

1. Eater The Best Cocktail Bars in San Antonio

1. Eater The Best Cocktail Bars in San Antonio

1. San Antonio Current The 50 best bars in San Antonio

1. San Antonio Current The 50 best bars in San Antonio

1. San Antonio Express-News #11 · Top 50 Restaurants in San Antonio
2. San Antonio Current The 50 best bars in San Antonio

1. San Antonio Current The 50 best bars in San Antonio

1. San Antonio Current The 50 best bars in San Antonio

1. San Antonio Current The 50 best bars in San Antonio

1. San Antonio Current The 50 best bars in San Antonio

1. San Antonio Current The 50 best bars in San Antonio

1. San Antonio Current The 50 best bars in San Antonio

1. San Antonio Current The 50 best bars in San Antonio

1. San Antonio Current The 50 best bars in San Antonio

1. San Antonio Current The 50 best bars in San Antonio

1. San Antonio Current The 50 best bars in San Antonio

1. San Antonio Current The 50 best bars in San Antonio

1. San Antonio Current The 50 best bars in San Antonio