Travelog - Day 23, Feb 23

This is the bridge into the harbour. We are parked underneath this overpass. The sound of traffic overhead as we walked to the aquarium was a little unsettling.


Here Al is entering the aquarium as he passes under a manmade waterfall.

Dusty, a river otter, not a sea otter is great fun to watch. Unfortunately he is not in good form this morning. Just like some of my students he is not focusing on the job at hand so his trainer ends the session. Sure wish I could have done that when I was teaching. "OK, students, you'll just have to go home until ..."

Perhaps Sean will remind me what kind of shark this is. His camoflage is brilliant.

Then the dolphins, quite the characters with such a broad smile. It's no wonder every one loves them. Sorry I missed one of them doing a triple flip. The heaviest one weighs just over 400 lbs so makes quite the splash.

After lunch we load the dogs into the car and head for the beach. Although there is a road indicated on the map, only a short section of the island is accessible, and only after paying $10 for entrance to the state park. It ends at the beach where you can now drive for some 50 more miles. We drive until we can see no more cars, stop and let the dogs loose. They head off with their noses to the ground. However, we have to corale them very quickly due to an approaching truck.

We are now at the beach where I spot these guys - Portugese Man-of-War, a type of stinging jelly fish, waiting for the tide to come back in (and it is). Fortunately these electric blue babies are marooned in the sand; their sting can be quite deadly I watched one raise its 'head', a dark pointy thing at the end of its bottle shape. If you look closely enough you can see its inards are black.

Other than these jelly fish and one type of long narrow clam-like shell, the beach is not nearly as interesting as South Padre which had tons of shells. And as Al says, not nearly as interesting as the one in Denmark which was also a nudist beach.