More of South Texas

Shrimp boats in the harbor at Port Isabel.

Looking from the motorhome at a ship heading out into the gulf.
Looking out for pirates while fishing on South Padre Island.
A HUGE oil rig cuts through the fog on its way to the gulf.

On the beach at Boca Chica.

Ditsy Dotty is saying we have arrived! NOT!!

Trophies from Port Isabel sport fishing tournaments.

Those who served here in the Mexican American and Civil Wars.

We have accepted the fact that it is always windy and continue to enjoy South Texas. It has been in the 70's and 80's with sunny skies almost every day. We love watching the birds as well as all the interesting things that go by on the water. We have done more exploring going to the Brownsville area and the beach at Boca Chica. We can see Boca Chica from the motorhome but it is a forty mile drive to the end of the paved road to get there. It is a beautiful beach with very few people. You can drive on the beach from where the Rio Grande enters the Gulf of Mexico to the inlet at South Padre Island. Driving to Boca Chica beach we only passed a few cars but the Border Patrol has a permanent check point set up where you must stop for inspection on your return trip. We did get to use our new GPS (Ditsy Dotty) which we purchased with gift certificates given to us by my brother and sister-in-law, Rick and Denise, for Christmas. She got us to a restaurant in Brownsville without a hitch so we decided we would go to Rasaca de La Palma State Park to do some birding. The picture above shows the results of that trip so I don't think we will be throwing our maps away.

We toured the Port Isabel Historic Museum which offers interesting exhibits on local history and the shrimp fishing industry. At its height over 12 million tons of shrimp a year came through this area. Presently, forty percent of the country's shrimp is still shipped from Port Isabel. The history of the development of sports fishing and tourism is also shown. Historically, there was a dispute over this land that lies between the Neuces River near Corpus Christi which Mexico said was the border and the Rio Grande which the US claimed as the border. The Mexican American War was fought to settle that dispute. The first battle of that war was fought near here at Palo Alto in 1846. The US won the war after Mexico City was captured in 1847. The Treaty of Guadalupe Hildago established the border and ceded all of California, Nevada, Utah and parts of four other states to the US. Among the soldiers who fought here were Grant, Lee and Meade who later played important roles in the Civil War. Ironically, the last battle of that war was fought near here at Palmito Ranch more than a month after Lee's surrender.