FRIDAY. Now our dates are catching up to us! For a day anyway. Moved from Mustang Island to Corpus Cristi and to a private campground, right on the bay only 1 1/2 miles from the Lexington Museum. Took a nice bike ride to check out the area. Downtown library is huge and full. Downtown seems to be modern, except for the huge and obviously very old Corpus Cristi Cathedral. On Saturday we will tour the boat and then make plans to move down the road some more. Weather is still great! Weekend to be cooler.
H says gotta go - - - time to burn some burgers on the grill !

OFF ROADING ON MUSTANG ISLAND !

THURSDAY Mustang Island and we stayed at
another neat Texas county park. Neuces county
park has brand new bath facilities that were really great. And a neat office lady, Linda, that answered a whole bunch of questions for us. The beach was not the sparkling white sand and the water was not emerald , but was still great. Fun to drive on and , thanks to Linda and her advise as to when to go looking for shells - I have added 2 starfish to my growing collection.

Wednesday we left Beaumont and headed south and got to enjoy a boat ride across Galveston Bay which was FULL of big boat traffic ! Watched several pods of dolphins on the way. From the boat ride we kept south and stayed at a county park just north of Freeport Texas. The park was actually on it's own little island. Mosquitoes as big as hummingbirds but when the sun went down- they did too! The lady in the office said it had to do with the tides. Lots of neat birds!

Can you beleive - over 100 rose bushes in the garden and they are all in full bloom! You'll have to wait till we get home to see the rest of the pictures!

H is tired of the way that our view from our kitchen window looks the same so we're moving on! Breakfast in Winnie Texas. Then on to Galveston. Temps this morning at 9am is 65.

H is fussing - - - gotta go

BEAUMONT , TEXAS

Monday and Tuesday in Beaumont.

Lots to tell you about ! We were dissappointed to find out that our friends , Steve and Diane were not able to join us for a visit after all. Maybe on our return north trip.

H had a filling that came out Monday evening so Tues morning was spent finding a dentist that could/ would take care of him. There are good dentists in Beaumont! We also found the Spindletop Oil Museum but it was not open yet, due to damage from hurricane Rita. So we did the next best - - - toured the Energy Museum in downtown. We then by accident found the McFadden-Ward home that was built in 1906 . It has over 12000 sq ft and is furnished with it's original furniture and family possessions. H says its the nicest home that we've ever toured !

TEXAS !

Monday , 10:00 am - - It's official - we have made it to Texas. We are sitting in the Welcome Center parking lot, using their free wifi. 19 days for this part of our journey - but we made it !

Was the 2nd cold night last night but the the heater works great and each morning we have woke up to a beautiful blue sky. It's already in the 50's. H just checked WTOL channel 11 tv site and got the snow report. Sorry!

Today's destination will be the Beaumont area for a day or so before heading to Galveston. H's friend Steve is coming down from north of Houston to meet us before we go.

The date says Sunday , but while camped at Fountainbleau, we toured this 1880's restored lumber baron's home. The Otis house is on the property of the Riverside State Park, just west of Mandeville La. Since then we hve moved on to Lake Charles La and are staying at the Sam Houston State Park till Monday morning. H is still fussing about keeping this puter connected to the internet. Once he figures things out, maybe we can get our stuff in order , eh ??!! We'll make it to Texas on Monday - - - maybe.

The inside of the Otis house was pretty neat. I could have selected a bunch of pictures to blog with but I chose this one because of the "laptop". This was Mr Otis' room and he loved to play solitare. The other rooms were done really well and the tour guide was great! In the kitchen was also a drying rack - just like the one we got from H's mom!

Ocean Springs Mississippi has lots of storm damage yet, but the downtown is redone and still has retained all of it's quaintness ! Can you see the truck parked down the block ?? The town is decorated very nicely for Christmas but there are also summer flowers in bloom yet !