Travelog - Day19, Feb. 19

A very slow start this morning. It’s laundry day, change the sheets, wash the rag rugs etc. Al gives me a choice of 2 destinations: Bentsen-Rio Grande Valley State Park or South Padre Island. No contest, as the ocean always wins in my books. While he drives, I try to finish off the embroidery ends on a dress I bought yesterday. What a chore. I shall have to apply some Fray Away on the back to stop the threads from migrating backward. Two of the t-shirts I bought have really heavy stabilizer with the embroidery. They will look much nicer if I cut away the excess. The challenge is not to cut the t-shirt.

As we travel along to Brownsville, I remark that it’s a good thing we didn’t think to stay there. So much construction with narrow lanes that poor Al would be white-knuckled to death.

According to Moon’s Texas, the bridge to South Padre Island is the longest in Texas. The island itself is quite a sight, wall-to-wall buildings, some of them about 6-8 stories tall. We turn northeast to drive the length of the island with no sighting of the water now.

We by pass beach #1. Beach #2 gets our vote and we pull into a very limited area for parking. No ATV’s in the dunes, dogs on leashes, but trucks drive by from who only knows where. I head for the water with Gypsy in tow. She is not as leery about the waves this time and actually tries to take a drink. I have Al take some pictures of Gypsy for Nicole, our breeder. I like the idea of waves in the background. Will have to wait and see what she thinks.

Driving to the end of the paved road, roughly 10 miles long, the car is literally sandblasted in the winds. Stopping at beach #4, the wind is too strong for me to have my picnic on the beach. Everything is covered with a fine layer of sand, wonderful to walk on, but not to eat. Will my teeth be smoother, whiter I wonder. As I wade back to the car, Al snaps a picture of ‘me and my friends’. It may look like I am feeding the gulls, but I’m not. In fact they just swooped down on me as I was returning to the car.

I forget to take a picture of the parasailors who are boogying along at a great rate of knots. The wind is almost parallel to the island so there is no return trip by sail for them. Reminds me of windsurfing in Cyprus. It sure looks like fun.

Tomorrow we are off to King Ranch, the largest ranch in the USA – employing 500 people working on 1.2 million acres, 2,000 miles of fencing, 500 miles of road, 60,000 cattle, and 300 registered quarter horses. The town of Kingsville has a university and museum & Saddle Shop whose owner makes saddles and other leather goodies, but basically services the Ranch. (www.King-Ranch.com)