On Friday we arrived 90 miles up the Valley to Falcon State Park just north of the Falcon Dam on the Rio Grande River.
Windy and warm (above 90F.) we found the park is used for two activities, fishing or birding. We have no boat so we went birding.
We will be going up the valley on Sunday to Laredo, Texas.
More photos:
On the 5th of March we went to Neuvo Progreso, Mexico for a look around a border town specializing in Dentistry and Eye Care and of course SHOPPING.
Teri actually enjoyed Mexico this time. We went in the morning and stopped for lunch on a second floor restaurant complete with live music and all the waiters in black and white suits. We both enjoyed our lunch and Teri did NOT get sick, unusual!!!!!
On the way to Mexico we ran into a sugar cane field being burnt.
Tomorrow we actually move 90 miles to a state park.
On March 1st we went to the Museum of South Texas History in Edinburg, Texas.
The museum has two facilities: a state of the art museum and the 1910 Old County Jail Annex. Exhibits explore geological origins, ancient cultures, Spanish exploration and ranching, the Mexican war and the Rio Grande. Also featured are a mammoth skeleton, a Coahuiltecan Indian camp and a walk-on steamboat.
More photos:
We have installed a new couch with a queen size hide a bed and a new recliner chair that bolts to the floor. Teri is happy so I am happy.
The couch has a regular mattress well as a air mattress with a top cover. Nice !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
We are very busy with stained glass, golf, swimming and sightseeing.
On Sunday we went to the Laguna Atoscosa National Wildlife Refuge. The Refuge is on the mainland looking out onto Laguna Madre then on to South Padre Island.
“The south Texas landscape is a unique blending of temperate, subtropical, coastal, and desert habitats. Mexican plants and wildlife are at the northernmost edge of their range, while migrating waterfowl and sandhill cranes fly down for the mild winters. This combination makes Laguna Atascosa National Wildlife Refuge world famous for its birds, and home to a mix of wildlife found nowhere else.
Laguna Atascosa NWR is the largest protected area of natural habitat left in the Lower Rio Grande Valley, an oasis for wildlife with few alternatives. The refuge's 45,000 acres become more valuable with each acre lost to development--valuable to wildlife and valuable to those who enjoy wildlife in wildlands.”
“Bayside Drive: This semi-paved, 15-mile, one-way loop passes through thorn forest and coastal prairies before reaching the Laguna Madre. The shelter at Redhead Ridge Overlook and numerous pullouts allow for nature photography and viewing. Note: Restrooms and drinking water are not available along the route.
Lakeside Drive: It's only a short 1 and a half miles out to the lake that gives the refuge its name. Atascosa means "muddy" in Spanish, which describes the shallow lake on windy days. The lake is an important resting and feeding area for the more than 20 species of waterfowl that winter here. Osprey Overlook features two permanently mounted telescopes for a closer look.”
Some photos:
Along the banks of the lower Rio Grande is the Santa Ana National Wildlife Refuge, a 2,088 acre refuge established in 1943 for the protection of migratory birds. Considered the ‘jewel’ of the refuge system, this essential ‘island’ of thorn forest habitat is host or home to nearly 400 different types of birds and a myriad of other species, including the indigo snake, malachite butterfly and the endangered ocelot.
At an ecological crossroad, Santa Ana is strategically located where subtropical climate, gulf coast, great plains and Chihuahuan desert meet. Thousands of birds from the Central and Mississippi flyways funnel through the area on their way to and from Central and South America. This small patch of midvalley riparian woodland is also habitat for about one half of all butterfly species found in the United States.
Before dams and control structures significantly reduced the flow of the Rio Grande, periodic floods cut shifting channels into the delta creating crescent-shaped oxbow lakes, referred to as ‘resacas.’ Santa Ana’s management program mimics the historical flooding of the Rio Grande, maintaining the bottom land hardwood forest and providing crucial nesting and feeding habitat for birds, watering holes for animals, and homes for countless amphibians, reptiles, crustaceans and insects.
With over 95 percent of the original habitat in the lower Rio Grande delta cleared or altered, Santa Ana is a reminder of the semitropical thorn forest that once dominated the area.
Before we got to the Refuse we when through some farm land.
cabbage.
Onions
Palms.
Then to the Santa Ana National Wildlife Refuse:
This is a 34 mile long stretch of white sand bordered to the east by the Gulf of Mexico and to the west by Laguna Madre bay.
In 1519, Spanish explorer Alonso Alvearez de Pineda was on a mapping mission for the King of Spain when he discovered the Brazos Santiago Pass. He described treacherous sandbars and a shoreline littered with spars and rigging from shops that had wrecked may years before.
In 1554 three ships, part of a treasure fleet outbound for
Spain, wrecked along the shores of Padre Island. Over three hundred people survived only to be hunted down and killed by local Indians while trying to walk southward for safety. Only two survived to tell the story.
The Spaniards sent ships and men who managed to salvage over 40% of the treasure that the three ships carried. The rest lay buried beneath the sands of Padre Island. It was the rediscovery and excavation of one of these ships by local treasure hunters in 1967 that led to the institution of the Texas State Antiquity Laws which covers all publicly owned property in the State of Texas. This jurisdiction also extends ten and 3/4 miles into the Gulf of Mexico.
In 1811, Padre Nicholas Balli, for whom the Island gets its name, was the first European to bring families to the Island. He and his family kept cattle, horses and mules.
By 1912, the southern part of Padre, now known as “Tarpon Beach”, was home to a hotel and a cluster of fishing camps.
in 1974 the second causeway opened to Padre Island. The residents of the Island voted for incorporation in April 1973. Thus the Town of South Padre Island was born.
