They float serenely in the water. They are super cute. They are sea turtles and they can be found all around South Padre Island. If you are lucky, you can swim with them in the wild. Yet, when they are unlucky, there is a place that will help them: Sea Turtles Inc.
Padre Island is a major birding destination. The island protects a salty, shallow bay, ideal for many birds to rest and eat during their migrations between Mexico and the rest of the USA. The South Padre Island Birding and Nature Center is perfectly located at a mixing of fresh water and salt water. It is a destination for birds of every variety, and those who wish to see them.
Thousands of miles from Death Valley yet only a couple weeks later, we wander a new collection of dunes. Very little of South Padre island is developed. The rest is rolling sand dunes for the crabs and clams and birds.
As far as I can divine, March on South Padre Island is an extended period of debauchery known as Spring Break. Wave after wave of college students descend onto the small spit of land along the Gulf Coast for each of their respective weeks off to experience everything that their parents earnestly told them not to do in the last eighteen years of their lives.
I have now resorted to using chapstick on my raw nose. Too many tissues have left my nose in unseasonable competition with Rudolf. Being sick on the road certainly is a mixed bag.
Tonight, for lack of a better spot and disinterest in spending camp fare, we settled down in a Pilot Truck stop parking lot. We wound down the evening with the dinner of champions: cup of noodles, while watching what appears to be a van camper and a homeless man chatting.
Big Bend National Park is 1,252 square miles of mountains, desert, and river in south east Texas. It sits in a niche along the Mexico border where the Rio Grand sweeps around half of the park's border. It is host to magnificent cliffs, breathtaking expanses, and vibrant wildlife.
Route 170 along the Rio Grande is a constantly compounding collection of cliffs, hoodoos, ravines, wildflowers, and ruins. We are headed to Big Bend National Park but via 67 to 170, setting us up for a winding road along the Rio Grande. It is yet another spot where we rejoice in our relative isolation but constantly bemoan our limited time. The route is about as close to the US-Mexico border as you can get without swimming in the Rio Grand. In our theme of traveling the border, you can't do much better than this.
The Chinati Foundation is a contemporary art museum. Its houses a collection of permanent installations across the rambling campus of a decommissioned air base. But it isn't a spot you just wander in to. No, It takes an appointment, a guide, and a lot of time.
We had a few hours to kill before our tour at the Chinati Foundation so we hit another notable art spot in town. Ballroom Marfa is a contemporary art space in the heart of town. Like all good things Marfa, it is a converted building. Before hosting films, music, and performing arts events and a gallery, the structure was a dance hall dating back to 1927.