Our Travel Blog

Well, after yesterdays disaster we were looking forward to meeting up with friends from Burlington and going to the kite festival on the beach at South Padre Island. We woke up to the sound of the furnace running, which is never good. The outside temperature was around 8C and as usual the wind was blowing.

At this stage we were wondering how to gracefully bow out of sitting on a cold wet beach watching other people fly kites. I checked the e-mails and there was one there from our friends saying it was still pi**ing down with rain on the island, and howabout we scrub the kite festival and go for supper later in the week.

When Lyn was first looking at things to do here, two of the main ones we wanted to do was the rodeo and the kite festival…. oh well, such is life.

Lyn went over to do the laundry this morning as yesterdays clothes were still soaking wet, as was the seat of the truck, much to Lyn’s disgust!

Hopefully the weather will improve a little so that we can pack up over the next couple of days in the dry.

Woke up to warm and humid again this morning with the temperature climbing to 27C.

After lunch we headed into the nearby town of Los Fresnos for the annual rodeo and agricultural fair. On the way in funny tones emitted from the radio followed by a computerised voice announcing that there were severe thunderstorm warnings in effect. We didn’t know the areas mentioned, so we didn’t worry!

We drove into a large field that was being used as a parking lot (car park!) and walked over to the fair grounds. There were a number of rides there, and round the outside of the fair were some open barns with livestock in one and a cake auction in the other!! Evidently the participants in the cake bake-off earlier in the day get to have their cakes auctioned off and they keep the profits!

In a large tent was a team of Clydesdale horses owned by the Budweiser brewery, unfortunately they weren’t on performing today, they were just there for viewing. Even so they are magnificent beasts.

We headed over to the stands surrounding the rodeo arena and were surprised to be met by our next door neighbours here at the resort. Turns out that they volunteer at the show each year, and they were acting as guides to the seats. While we sitting there waiting for the show to begin, there was a road roller, followed by a tractor preparing the arena.

Zamboni - Texas Style

For the European readers a Zamboni is the machine that goes out and grooms the ice at hockey games.

As the time marched towards the start the skies grew darker, then they started flashing then water started falling gently; however it looked as though we would be lucky and miss the storm.

Rodeo Horses - Los Fresnos, Tx

Unfortunately, the weather had decided not to avoid us, and the rain got a little heavier…. It was time to move under the stands and keep dry. This worked fine for about 15 minutes, then the heavens opened and the stands provided very little protection, in fact given the proximity of some of the lightning strikes and the fact that the stand structure was metal, it probably was not a good place to be! By this time we were (literally) soaked to the skin so we decided to call it a day. We couldn’t get any wetter, and it was cooling off, so we waded back to the truck. In places in the field the water was 2-3 inches deep already. We made it back to the truck and I was glad we had 4 wheel drive to get through the muddy field and out onto the road.

An unfortunate end to the day, neither of us had seen a rodeo before and we were both looking forward to it. Five hours later it is still raining, and the wind is strong enough to cause the trailer to shudder at times. Looking at the radar, there is still more rough weather to come over night and the temperature has dropped to 12C..

Hot and humid again today, we maxed out around 27C (81F).

Today we headed out to the town of Harlingen about 15 miles north of here. We had been here before but only to the shopping mall area. Today we were heading into the older part of the city in search of murals. According to the map we got from the local chamber of commerce there were a number of murals on the sides of buildings in a 3 block area. Out of the first 4 sites on the map only one had a mural, not a good start. However I did find a baby palm tree growing wild at the side of the road. (Sorry it’s a bit blurry). The tree was only a couple of inches tall.

Baby Palm Tree

As we moved further down the street we found more murals, still not as many as the map said, but at least enough to make it interesting.

Mural 1, Harlingen, Tx

Mural 2 Harlingen, Tx

Mural 3 Harlingen, Tx

The street we were one appeared to be the original main street, but like many similar streets we have seen in small town USA many of the stores are now empty, and those that are open are not at all busy. I guess the recession and big box stores can be thanked for that. After stopping for a coffee we headed off to one of the box stores! (Where are the emoticons when you need them?)

Lyn is working on a  project which needed some special supplies so we headed off to HobbyLobby. Before leaving we printed out a 40% off any one item coupon. Lyn found what she was looking for, but needed two packets not one, the coupon was only good for one of the packets so it was time to put technology to work. With the help of my new android phone I decided to download a second coupon. Problem was I don’t have a data plan, no problem… I’ll use WiFi. No open WiFi signals, no problem, there’s a MacDonalds across the parking lot, they have free WiFi. Off to MacDonalds, log in get the coupon on the screen, back to the store, show screen to check out girl and voila, 40% off. At least it saved us a few dollars, and more importantly to me, Lyn now sees at least one use for my new toy!!

Well, another hot and humid day. The last week or so has been lacking in sunshine and forecast doesn’t hold out much hope for the next few days.

Today was shopping day, and that was about all we accomplished, life is so tough!

In the afternoon we went into the local town of Los Fresnos to buy tickets for the annual rodeo this week-end. Should prove interesting.

Finally a dry, but foggy morning and about 18C when we woke up.

Today we planned to visit the Brownsville Zoo; looking at the web it didn’t seem too big of a zoo, and our expectations weren’t that great. As we went out to the truck the rain returned, luckily it was a very small shower and we were good for the rest of the day. We headed back south towards the old part of town and parked at the zoo, coincidentally (!?!) today was half price day for out of State visitors.

Once we got inside and saw the layout of the zoo it was apparent that a lot of thought had gone into the design and a lot of exhibits existed in a fairly small space, but the place didn’t seem crowded .

Almost immeadiately we came across the gorilla area which had attracted a lot of interested visitors. The reason soon became apparent, there was a new arrival in the form of a 10 day old baby. Watching the mother and baby was amazing, it was almost like watching a human mother and her baby, the mother was continually patting the baby or rubbing it’s head or kissing it.

Mother and Baby Gorilla, Brownsville Tx

The zoo had a wide range of animals from around the world, although to Lyn’s dismay there were no elephants.

There was a building dedicated to Australian animals which was kept fairly dark as many of them were nocturnal and this was a way to keep them active during zoo hours. The following exchange took place between a zoo guide and a couple from south of Canada and North of Mexico, to my warped sense of humour it rates right up there with last years “Is Christmas day on December 25th in Canada as well??”

Guide: Did you know that all mammals native to Australia are marsupials?

Couple: Oh, is that why you keep it dark in here?

OK, back to our regularly scheduled programming.

We found this colourful tortoise in the Asia section. Evidently these have been well document as to having a life span of around 150 years, with some evidence pointing to some having survived to > 180 years!

Radiated Tortoise, Brownsville Tx

Yet again the weather people got it wrong (there must be some ex-environment Canada guys down here). It was warm and overcast when we woke up, and about an hour later the rains came again.

Because it has been so dry in recent months the ground has become very dry and well packed and the rain does not soak in too well, rather it sits on top and slowly soaks in so every where you walk is muddy.

Two discoveries today. I had always meant to work out whether it was cheaper to run the fridge and hot water heater off propane or hydro (electric for those South and East of the Canadian border). Since I last filled up the propane tank I have been keeping track of the hydro usage, and have finally determined that it costs twice as much to run off propane. The switches have now been thrown and hydro now powers the devices.

The second discovery was more of a whoops! moment rather than anything useful. Not only did we tour all around Brownsville and its historic district yesterday, we took our garbage with us. In the morning we put the garbage into the back of the truck with the intent of putting it in the dumpster on the way out. For some reason it was still in the back of the truck this morning!

Hopefully the weather will dry up and we can get out somewhere tomorrow.

Woke up to a dark overcast morning. Somehow the weather forecast had changed overnight from 0% chance of rain to 70%. About 30 minutes later the rain arrived and stayed for about an hour.

We were going to go to another wildlife refuge today, but the rain had made the ground very muddy, so we’ll try that another day.

This afternoon we headed into the old part of Brownsville which still has a main Street. On many of the stores you can still see the Spanish / Mexican influence in their design, which is not really surprising as the Main Street runs straight onto one of 3 bridges crossing from Brownsville over to Mexico. We drove around the residential area of the old district, and like most areas down here it was a mixture of good homes through to run down homes with a few blocks of square buildings looking like military housing, which was actually the city provided low cost housing.

Obviously (!) some shopping happened to occur on the trip, but this time we found a store I could enjoy, Harbor Freight Tools. This place was quite amazing and had a huge selection of tools and bits and pieces, wish I had one nearby at home.

Today was a non day. Just sat around doing nothing, as a well trained retiree should. The day started warm and got to about 24C, but after lunch the deep freeze set in and temperatures plummeted to 20C.

The highlight of the day involved a bowl of strawberries, but I am not allowed to talk about it. Further information available from Lyn if you e-mail her!

Cooler and calm again today, although we did struggle up to 24C by mid afternoon.

Lyn wanted to do some shopping in Brownsville so we combined it with a day out to the beach. Although we had been to the Northern end of Brownsville we hadn’t ventured closer into the city. From what we saw of it the city was clean and modern with all the amenities and stores you’d expect (except a doughnut store).

Shopping (successfully) completed we headed out on the Boca Chica Highway, which we believed would lead us to a beach. About 15 miles later we could see the Gulf and signs proclaiming that the paved surface would end. Well end it did, right on the beach. Again this was another beach that could be driven on, so we did.

Our Truck on Boca Chica Beach, Tx.

The beach went about 1.5 miles south where it stopped at the Rio Grande / Mexican Border and a few miles north where it stopped at the Brownsville Shipway, an entrance for boats and oil rigs to go inland towards Brownsville. Directly across the shipway is the Southern end of South Padre Island, unfortunately there was no way of crossing the shipway by car.

We went for a walk along the beach, but apart from a few seagulls, sandpipers and a stranded jellyfish there was little in the way of wildlife.

Once we got back to the trailer it was time for a little more upgrading. Last week I put a vent cover over the bedroom vent. Today it was the bathroom vent that got a cover. As this vent has a fan in it the installation was a little different, but it went OK. Now both vents can be left open without fear of wind damage or rain getting in.