| We left Corpus Christi by heading south. This took us briefly to Padre
Island and then across to Mustang Island en route to Port Aransas. This is the
bridge across to Padre Island. |  |
 | It was a surprise to
us that the ferry is free but this turned out to be true for all the
ferries. The service is very efficient. We had been worried because of our
size and weight but they had several trucks on with us. |
| Once we had used the ferry to cross the gap through which
the large ships reach Corpus Christi, we turned along the coast for the town
of Rockport, where we found the University of Texas Marine Science Institute
(see next page). |  |
 | We travelled on
towards Galveston but stopped along the way at at the town of Palacios. The
site here is both an RV park and a marina. And next door is the home of a
fairly substantial shrimp fishing fleet. I guess there must be a season
because there was little movement in the time we were there. |
| This is the marina with the RVs camped around it. It is really
a very pleasant site although at the time it was a little windy. |  |
 | This is
one of the fishing boats and is quite typical of the design. They all have
the twin poles with booms which I think can be lowered to enable the nets
to be opened out whilst fishing. |
| It is really quite like a lot of English fishing ports when the
fleet is in with rows of boats lined up at the wharf side. |  |
 | Heading for Galveston
we started to see more and more evidence of the oil industry as we passed
refinery-type plants every few miles. |
| Not all of these would be oil refineries, some are chemical and
plastics plants. We certainly couldn't tell, but this one belongs to
Phillips 66 which is a petroleum company to me. |  |
 | We also passed this
statue near Freeport on the other side of the road. I'm not sure who it is
but I would guess Sam Houston who was the founder of Texas after he defeated
the Mexican general Santa Anna and revenged the loss of the Alamo. |
| We headed on eastwards
and a little south to reach Galveston. This is actually on another island which
is reached from the western end by a toll bridge. The island is 44 miles
long but only a couple of miles wide at its widest. It is really a sand bar but does have
lots of houses since everybody wants to live by the sea, despite the risk of
hurricanes. Almost all the houses are built in the same way with
a wooden frame. The bottom level only contains a garage and perhaps utility rooms,
with all the main living space upstairs, since the area is prone to flooding.
The more expensive new houses have lifts installed for those who can't (or
can afford not to) use the stairs. |  |
 | The building is clad with
chip board type wooden panels, then insulation panels often made by a
company called Tyvek. The outer decorative layer is
usually either wood or plastic panels, but could be brick facing. |
| Another
sunset, this time from the campsite on the seafront at Galveston. |  |
 | When we arrived the wind was blowing offshore and the sea
was very calm. When we left a couple of days later, the wind had shifted and
was blowing from the south. This gave some fairly lively waves. This is with
about 20-25mph winds. I'm not sure I would like to live this close and low
down with 150+mph winds blowing! |
|