Heading east

Saturday, February 11, 2012

Indianola Park. This is such a nice place we decided to stay another day. Ted and Liz are at the city campground in Victoria. We’re planning on meeting up tomorrow, but the question was where. The City of Port Lavaca has a campground for $28/night. We stayed there once before. The location is very nice, right on the bay and there is a nice accessible boardwalk that goes into the coastal marsh area. Other then that, it’s your basic jammed-up-against-your-neighbor campground. The original plan was to meet there. This morning, I e-mailed Ted a photo of where we are now with a note that they can have this for free or Lighthouse Point for $28. They will be joining us here tomorrow.
It’s cold, sunny and very windy today. 44* this morning. On the lee side of the camper, the sunny south, it’s not so bad with a jacket on.
Another RV pulled in today; a good sized 5th wheel. There are now seven of us sharing about a mile of beach. One couple, I think, lives here in their van. I was talking to the guy yesterday, he’s about my age, and I was left with the impression that this park was about the only place in their budget. There is a bathroom so I guess you could get by living in a van if necessary. Another couple in a 5th wheel, have every appearance of being here for the long haul much like the folks I met on the causeway near Aransas Pass who had been there since October. This afternoon a group of guys showed up for some fishing. After a few hours they left with out catching anything as best I could tell. My neighbor from Iowa said the weather was too cold for the fish. Fisherman, golfers and bowlers have one thing in common; they are never short of reasons (excuses) why things aren’t going their way. Another fellow was touring through the area on a riding lawnmower. An hour or so later, a pickup truck came by towing the guy on the mower. I guess he either broke down or ran out of gas. Not much to do in Magnolia Beach on a Saturday, I suppose. You either fish or cruise around on your mower.

Sunday.

A chilly 43* in the morning, windy and grey. Nothing that a jacket and cup of tea couldn’t fix. The high today was right at 49*; never did see the sun.
Ted and Liz pulled in today around 11:30. It’s been since about April of ’08 since we’ve seen each other. Liz and Carol spent time visiting and Ted tried to teach me the finer points of his campground database. He had mixed results.

Monday.

Grey, windy and rainy but at least it’s warmer. This morning it was 60* when I got up. I gave Ted my old Garmin gps unit so now he can see just how his wonderful campground database works. Visited and just poked around. A slow day.

Tuesday:
Ted and Liz are headed back to the city campground in Victoria. This might be one of TX’s best camping deals. A full hookup site, with lots of stores nearby, for only $50/week. Ted said it's a small campground and they don't take reservations so you just drive over and hope for the best. We’re headed east towards Galveston then on to Pensacola via Cajun Country. Tonight we’re at the San Luis Pass County Park on our own little chunk of concrete next to a monster Class A, but with a very nice view of the San Luis Pass and bridge out the back window. $32/night. This campground is quite nice if you like such things. It's a parking lot with a 7’ wide plot of grass between sites,so no sand get's tracked inside, and everything else is nice and tidy. We needed to give the holding tanks a long overdue flushing and get water so here we are. After getting set up, we both agreed that this is simply not us. We feel jammed in. I asked the guy in the office if it was OK to camp on the beach around the Pass. He said it was. Gopher and I took a walk around looking for a nice spot but the sand was softer then I like to be driving on.
Looking back at our camping on this trip, we’ve stayed at very few campgrounds. We go to some length to avoid them.

Unfortunately, the further east we head, the more our camping options will be limited to campgrounds. The large tracks of public land are just not there.

The view to the rear. San Luis Pass.