From May 1–4, 2026, San Antonio will host the American Association of Neurological Surgeons Annual Scientific Meeting (AANS 2026), bringing together the neurosurgical community — and the All Star team — for four days of innovation, collaboration, and transformation.
It’s a schedule built for deep focus, rapid synthesis, and constant cognitive engagement — the kind that can leave even the most resilient prefrontal cortex quietly asking for a reset.
San Antonio makes that easier than most cities.
This guide, inspired by AARP’s Six Pillars of Brain Health, is designed to help you stay sharp between sessions — with just enough movement, novelty, and actual downtime to keep your brain functioning at a high level through day four. Because if anyone understands the value of maintaining peak cognitive performance, it’s this group.
Ongoing Exercise
Start with movement — the simplest way to clear the system and set the tone for the day.
1. Stroll the River Walk
Vibrant, walkable, and lined with more activity than your hippocampus really needs to keep track of; the River Walk is chronically underrated as a morning ritual. A few miles along the San Antonio River before sessions is the closest thing to a neural warm-up outside the OR.
2. Bike the Mission Trail
Eight miles. Four Spanish colonial missions. This scenic stretch along the river is equal parts movement and a chance to clear your head — with built-in rest stops that just happen to be 300-year-old UNESCO World Heritage Sites. Structured enough to quiet the internal noise, and just removed enough from downtown to feel like a real reset.
San Antonio River Walk
Restorative Sleep
After a full day of sessions, the goal shifts from input to recovery.
3. Sunset at the San Antonio Botanical Garden
Thirty-three acres of curated quiet. Enough visual variety to stay engaged, not enough stimulation to stay activated. Think of it as a gentle system shutdown — the kind your brain has been asking for since the second afternoon keynote.
4. Evening GO RIO boat cruise
A slow glide through the River Walk as the city dims down gives your default mode network a chance to finally clock in. The steady motion, quiet water, and soft lights do most of the work — you just have to let it.
River Walk Cruise
Eat Right
At some point, you’ll need to refuel — strategically… or otherwise.
5. Tacos at Mi Tierra Café y Panadería
Open 24 hours since 1941, Mi Tierra Café y Panadería features vibrant murals, strolling mariachis, and some of the best Tex-Mex in the city. None of it fits the Mediterranean diet. All of it is exactly what your dopamine receptors ordered.
6. Graze the Pearl District
A Saturday morning (May 2) farmers market, riverfront restaurants, local bakeries, and enough variety to make “just one more stop” feel like a clinical recommendation. Graze, wander, and repeat until your next session pulls you back in.
Pearl District
Engage Your Brain
Not everything has to be passive.
7. Wander through the San Antonio Museum of Art
Housed in a former brewery (yes, really), this museum spans 5,000 years of human creativity across cultures and continents — great for engaging your brain between sessions. Moving through it activates pattern recognition and visual processing — a different kind of workout for a brain that’s been running one mode all day.
8. Descend into the Natural Bridge Caverns
Sixty million years in the making, the Natural Bridge Caverns offer a full dose of novelty beneath the surface. Guided paths wind through dramatic underground formations in cool, low-lit silence — full sensory contrast to a conference hall running at full throughput. Call it cogitive-cross training at its finest.
Natural Bridge Caverns
Be Social
The type that doesn’t involve name tags.
9. Drinks at the Esquire Tavern
One of the oldest bars in Texas, right on the River Walk, with a long wooden bar and a crowd that tends toward good conversation. The kind of place that turns “one drink after sessions” into a two-hour debrief nobody planned, and everyone needed.
10. Ghost Tour Through Historic San Antonio
Lantern-lit streets, centuries of history, and stories that engage your amygdala in all the right ways. The Sisters Grimm Ghost Tours wander past the Alamo and through the city’s most haunted corners — equal parts history lesson and shared adrenaline. Nothing bonds a group faster than a little well-curated fear.
The Alamo
Manage Stress
Eventually, the system needs a reset.
11. Find Stillness at the Japanese Tea Garden
Stone bridges, koi ponds, shaded paths, and a pace that politely refuses urgency. Built inside a former quarry and consistently under-visited, it’s one of the city’s best-kept secrets — and one of the easiest ways to fully shift into parasympathetic mode. And, beautiful enough to make you forget you have a 7 a.m. panel.
12. Mokara Spa on the River Walk
Right on the River Walk and fully committed to lowering your baseline cortisol, this spa offers relaxing massages, rejuvenating facials, and an environment perfect for a brain that hasn’t stopped firing since breakfast.
Japanese Tea Garden
Stop by Booth #1060 at AANS 2026
Whether you’re logging steps, keeping your mind engaged, or giving your nervous system some well-earned time-off, San Antonio makes it easy to give your brain exactly what it needs during AANS 2026.
And inside the conference hall, be sure to visit All Star Healthcare Solutions at booth #1060 — we’d love to connect, talk locum tenens neurosurgery opportunities, or compare favorite River Walk detours.
We’re also giving away an Oura Ring in celebration. Fill out the form to enter for your chance to win.
If this conference has you thinking about what’s next, browse our current neurosurgery openings nationwide.