The next step of our trip took us from Sea Rim to Galveston.  Both are Texas State Parks on the shore of the gulf of Mexico teeming with migratory birds this time of the year.  Texas has many faces, and the southeast along the coast of the Gulf of Mexico is very different from the northwest part of Texas we’ve seen last year.

Sea Rim State Park

The drive to Sea Rim State Park was a bit surreal.  There are monster refineries and decommissioned oil rigs along the shore in stark contrast to the beautiful shorelines.

In our tradition of not booking sites ahead because “we never know how long it will take us to get there and who knows what we may want to do on the way”, we arrived at the park with no reservation.  This is a good place to pause and praise colder weather in Texas.  The helpful ranger told us that we are lucky since they had a lot of weather-related cancellations, but she she encouraged us to book ahead.

We may need to reconsider our strategy from now on.

Sea Rim is a small park with very few campsites and a big beach.  You can drive on the beach and we took Buffy for a spin.

The beach at sunset is usually a magical place and it didn’t disappoint.

Shell hunting was productive.

The park is surrounded by several Wildlife Management areas, and an abundance of migratory and local birds.

McFadden Wildlife Management Area

Nice catch Mr. Grackle!

These Black Vultures reminded us of Statler and Waldorf from the Muppets.  We know that they were talking about us.

Interestingly different bird species don’t seem to hang out together.

White Ibis

and lots of Osprey on the hunt.

Except for this one that was more interested in pooping in our general direction.  Perhaps it heard what the Black Vultures were saying.

Sabine Pass

We are introduced to coastal architecture.  Stilts and pastels.

We drove into the closest habitation, Sabine Pass and ate in the only food establishment in town along with refinery workers and park rangers.  The gumbo was a bit disappointing, but the catfish was really good.  Two dishes crossed off the experience dishes bucket list.

There is an interesting park commemorating a strategic pass that witnessed Civil War battles and defence systems from the Second World War.

But oil is always in the background

 

And we witnessed the catch of a fairly big red fish.  This guy was excited to have it for his Christmas dinner.

We took the ranger’s advice and booked ahead a couple of nights in Galveston State Park before moving on.

Museum of the Gulf Coast

On the way to Galveston we stopped at the very interesting Museum of Gulf Coast in Port Arthur.  This museum has everything relating to coast heritage: geology, ecology, Palaeontology, archaeology, local history, music, art, pop culture, and of course celebrating home-grown artist, Janis Joplin.

One of the museum employees chased us down and asked if we are the couple from Canada and can they take our picture for their Facebook page.  We agreed, but in revenge too a picture of the picture taker to post here.

Check them out! it’s worth the stop.

We couldn’t resist driving by Janis Joplin’s childhood home.

There’s a really cool free ferry to Galveston.  It’s a short ride, but there are usually dolphins riding along and we were fortunate to catch a glimpse of a few of them.  No pictures though.

Only Galveston in the horizon

Galveston State Park

More pastel homes on stilts on the way to the park,

and more birds.

We hiked the trails in the park and in the nearby Brazoria Wildlife Management area.

This Great Blue Heron was a bit awkward

and goofy

but at the end managed some heron-grace as well.

We heard an egret speak for the first time and it sounded a lot like a Gauloises-smoking Frenchmen with a bad cough.  Startling.

Tony Spotted 2 Javelinas ahead of us on the trail, but we missed the photo-op.

Downtown Galveston was a nice surprise. The Strand district and is an interesting part of town to walk around.

with interesting buildings

shops

and history

We are enjoying the hikes and the drives in the area, but we were itching to move on.  We booked (ahead) a couple of nights at Palmetto State Park  as our last stop in Texas and we’re off.

Louisiana, here we come!

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