Padre Island National Seashore...

Aloha, from the tip of Texas!

We arrived here on Friday night, and we've been living the beach-bum life ever since. We've been having some experiences. Some really good, some not so good... Here are the Top Ten Texas Things you need to know...

1. DIRECTIONS… Prior to arriving, Val read all the info on the National Park Website. It said to drive in, all the way to the ranger station, which is blocking the road (Park Road 22 to be exact), and pay the entrance fee. We weren’t going to have an entrance fee, due to having the National Park Pass, but never-the-less, the instructions from NPS were to check in. The instructions also didn’t describe very well where the entrances to the beaches or the (closed) campgrounds (err … aka … parking lots for RVs) were. When we arrived, Mike noticed the “North Beach” entrance, but Val said, “No, we can’t go there, we have to go to the ranger station” So we went to the ranger station. Which was closed. They aren’t even charging day fees right now, according to the sign on the window. So, Mike, slightly irritated, says “Great, where do I turn around to get to the North Beach entrance?” and Val says, “Why would the entrance to the National Park be before the Ranger Station? Keep going, let’s see if it’s further ahead.” Well, I think you all know the rest of the story… The entrance we needed was the North Beach entrance we passed before the Ranger Station. So, Val caused all kinds of unnecessary irritation.

Lesson to be learned - Val still isn't good with directions, even if she's been practicing hard and is getting better little by little...so don't trust her all the time with directions.

2. ON THE BEACH… We are camping ON. THE. BEACH. Awesome!! Right?? This is bucket list stuff right here. We pulled in with a little inlet between the dunes to our back side, room to sit on our front side, and we appeared to be out of high tide range… All is good! Right? Well… almost. But there is so much more to being on the beach than just being ON the beach.

Full moons mean higher tides. So, on Friday night, we believe the high tide went up underneath us over night. No huge harm or foul. The stabilizer pads have sunken slightly into the sand, yes. The tires on the camper have sunken ever so slightly into the sand as well, ok. The stabilizer jacks and possibly then entire under carriage is now coated with salt water, that's not good. It is “free” for up to 14 days, and I personally had in my mind we would stay the full 14 days, why not, right? Beach, Sun, Waves, what could go wrong there? Well, I’ll tell you….

3. WIND... When we were making plans to head down here, someone mentioned, "Other than getting sand in every orifice, it's a great place to stay!" We laughed. We've been to the beach before. We're from New England!! We know beach sand! Mike grew up at Rye Beach with his grandmother in the summers of his youth. We didn't think twice. WELL... It's not so much the sand, it's the WIND! .

It never stops. It's blowing at hurricane force ALL DAY and ALL NIGHT. In the morning, it's on-shore, then it moves and it's coming from the left, by 2o'clock it's coming from the right, at dinnertime (7ish) it's off-shore. North – East - South – West – Repeat ... all day, all night. Sometimes it’s coming from two places at once, like you're standing in a tornado.

Opening the camper door is dangerous...both to the camper (slamming full force out against the camper exterior or slamming in against the door frame, which, isn’t all that sturdy to begin with) AND to the people trying to get in or out (without getting a hand or foot crushed by the door that’s flying back at you). SLAMMM!!! Wow. THAT'S what I would warn someone about who is coming here to visit. "Watch out for that wind!" The website shows tents set up on the beach… I personally wouldn’t attempt that. But to each their own.

4. SAND... As we were warned, there is, in fact, beach sand in every orifice of everything we own. Since this is boondocking, we don’t have AC, so all of our windows need to be open to keep cool (remember that wind? It helps and it hinders…) The inside of the camper has a film sand that we can't get rid of, and I'm washing the thing down every night. The floors are covered, it's in the beds, it's in the creases of the couch, it's in the carpet. The dogs have it on their skin under their fur, pet them backwards and there's sand in the air! The generator is covered. The truck has a layer on it that we'll have to wash off even to get out of here.

"Sand. Salt. Everywhere." - Mike B.

5. WIND... Did I mention it's windy? Friday night, our first night here, there were some dark scary looking clouds blowing in. Mike and I scurried to put all the chairs and such away. I got inside about 30 seconds before he did, and as he was coming in the door, the rain let loose and pelted his back, soaking him. We closed the windows, plugged in the little fan (gotta keep the pugs cool you know), and sat down on the couch to see what we were in for. The rain only lasted about 5 minutes, but the WIND! It was shaking the camper. I kid you not, i was worried we were experiencing an earthquake. If the camper hadn't been still hitched to the truck, we might have blown away!

We went out mid-tornado to recover our beach mat meant to prevent some sand from coming in on our feet, it was flapping proudly like a Texas flag by one remaining stake in the ground. Then we had to recover the solar panels, before they got damaged… luckily, they hadn’t started flapping in the wind yet. It was like a movie, when you see a sandstorm roll over the travelers in the desert, and they are stuck until morning and can’t find their cars when they wake up...

Anty Em!! Anty Em!! It's a twister! It's a twister!!

It was an experience.

6. PUGS... We have a sweet set up, the camper door is facing the ocean and behind the camper is the pug play area (3 metal dog pens, linked together, big place to run and dig and have pug fun). Well, we have determined that Ruby, the little lady who got lost in an ice storm last winter, that's Ruby, well, she's an inside dog. Yup. That's it. She HATES being outside. It scares the crap out of her. She will bark until she is blue in the face. And now, she only has to bark a time or two because she has us trained. WE, the humans, have been trained by a 15-pound pug. She barks, we bring her inside, she gets what she wants, to NOT be outside. Oh well. The other 3 dogs (2 pugs and a Lady Bird) LOVE being outside.

7. WIND... As I write this post, the camper is rocking back and forth in the wind. Slowly sinking deeper and deeper into the beach sand. Swallowing us slowly. Reclaiming us, ashes to ashes, dust to dust, beach sand to beach sand.

8. Have I mentioned the SAND yet?... The grill won’t work. Why? Well, because there's beach sand in it somewhere, screwing up the propane connection somewhere. Oh yeah, and the biggest burner on the stove, you know, the one you must light if you are going to use either of the tiny back burners? Yeah, that burner won’t start with the clicker knob. I need to use an Aim'n'Flame. I assume that is also sand related.

9. WAVES... The water here is so warm guys. I mean, we're almost in Mexico. It's the Gulf of Mexico in fact. Nice, perfect water, like a New England pool in August. The water isn't overly pretty, it's got a brownish tint to it due to the Big Mis' dumping all its sediment (and trash) into the Gulf. The sediment is also being kicked up from the offshore oil rigs we can see in the distance. But those waves... We've never seen anything like them. They are constant. I'd say there's about 3-4 feet between the waves, and you have just enough time to get your feet planted on the ground after the last wave that sent you flying before the next wave hits you. One after another after another. It's a core workout just to stand waist deep in the water. It's so warm though, it’s totally worth it.

The other downfall of these intense waves is that every piece of trash that has found its way into the Gulf of Mexico is dropped onto the beach...here. Every day. Mike and I spent about 10 minutes one evening picking up trash that had washed ashore. We filled a Walmart bag in no time. We can't continue picking it all up like we had hoped because we wont have room to pack it all into the truck when we leave, and there aren't any trash receptacles in the park.

Callie has been working on her surfing skills with Mike standing by. The current here is ferocious. It's just not safe to be out in the water alone. Good bonding time for them. She's almost mastered the jumping up and standing move, but since the waves are breaking every 3-4 feet, her 6-foot board is getting caught and it throws her off. She is relentless though, and just keeps getting back on the board and trying again. If she can get up on these waves, fighting this wind and rip tide, I have no doubt that by the next beach we find, Callie will be surfing like a pro!

10. VAL and her CACTI… So, I had this “awesome” idea to transplant some little sprigs of the giant cactus that was nearby us at our last park. Mike suggested it may be illegal to do so (you know, like picking the lilacs in Rochester, NH), so I looked it up, and NOPE! Not illegal. So the day we were leaving I got up nice and early and went and took my cuttings. Yesterday I transplanted them into cactus soil in cups. Well... I got prickles all over my hands, both hands, all fingers. It was awful. How do you get the prickles out when all of your fingers are prickled? I thought using my teeth might be a good idea, and it was, temporarily, until one of those nasty little prickles got loose in my mouth and lodged itself in my gum, under my tongue. Super fun. Everyone was laughing, myself included, because if you can’t laugh at yourself, how are you going to survive this life? Mike let me know after I was covered in the prickles that he told me it was a bad idea, knowing it wasn't illegal, but hoping that would be enough to deter me. He asked what my parents might say if they saw me flailing my arms around flipping out about cacti prickles... I told him my Dad would be proud of me for going on an adventure. My mom would likely say, "Oh Val..."

Mike thought all my animation was great I guess and attempted recording a video of me that thankfully didn’t record. If it had, I might be a contender on America’s Funniest Home Video this year… but alas… there is no lasting proof… I am still pulling prickles out of my fingers though…

I thought I’d be done at 10… but no, there are still two more situations I have created that has caused even more undue stress on my dear husband… I'll call them Thing 2 and Thing 3...

Thing 2... Guys, I broke the TV remote. I was pouring hot water out of a pan, and it leaked onto the counter, where the remote also happened to be, and I didn’t notice, and now the TV remote is toast. I have downloaded an app to replace it on my phone. However, if we ever loose internet or switch to a different provider, there will be no way to reconnect the TV to that WIFI without a “real” remote. (Which I have now researched and found that we can order a replacement, once we have an address again.)

Thing 3... Lastly, in an attempt to reduce the temperature in the camper quickly (to save Ruby’s life, because she had a tight nose, and she can't breath properly, and she can’t over heat or she may die, and she was panting so pathetically, I felt drastic measures needed to be taken), I opened the door of the camper, leaving just the screen door closed. Boy, it cooled off quick! Nice refreshing breeze.. ahhh..... The door had only been open for maybe 2 minutes when what did our wondering eyes did appear… a nosey lady holding another little dog approaching Mike outside, walking straight towards the freaking door!

Well… all the dogs went nuts, which is not a rare thing really, it happens about once an hour, minimum, and in a split-second Ruby must have rammed into the screen, and it ripped out. The screen on the bottom of the front door, 2.5 feet by 2.5 feet square, came out of the door. That fast. So, now I have promised to repair the door myself, since it was my fault (I had been warned multiple times that leaving the screen door open would end in peril)… but knowing my dear husband the way I do, he will find a way to repair it long before I do and he will take on the annoying task of re-screening a door that will not easily be removed from the camper.

Marriage, for better or worse…I’m usually causing the worse. So lucky he loves me!

So, Padre Island National Seashore. It has been amazing. I love it here. But with the effort and cost of getting all the sand and salt off everything we own (which is what we’ll be working on later this week), I’m not sure you could call this “free” camping. I’m so glad we didn’t know what we didn’t know, and we did it. It’s been an experience of a lifetime.

I have been shooting sunsets and sunrises. Trying to capture the tiny crabs that live in the holes on the beach in the mornings as they skitter around like cockroaches and I’ve been videoing the funny little birds that live on the beach. I hope to string it all together into a video that I can share with you, but given my workload with school, it may be a few weeks. We’ll see. Stay tuned!