If it's Wednesday, it must be Texas.
While I hadn't ever been exposed to "swamp" growing up, I would be lying if I called the drive between New Orleans and Houston "exotic" just mile after mile of swamp. Except when you looked up, and a 10 story mountain was in front of you. Okay, not a real mountain, but on occasion the road shot at a startling angle up (and likewise down) to bridge a navigable waterway.
Later, I would learn that is also the way that you build interchanges in Texas, 10 stories tall.
I arrived in Houston, and scooted on over to the northwest edge of town where T-Bone works by early afternoon, and just chilled out (and helped the support desk answer a few questions via Blackberry, when I could get signal). T-Bone led me back to his house (his wife, Mrs. Ivy, was actually back in Illinois, taking care of her terminally ill mother.)
The next day, he had to work, and I hopped back in the car and headed to the neighboring city of Galveston. I'm a "Love the beach / Hate the water" guy. I spent most of the day exploring driving around the city, and enjoying the post-Labor Day quiet.
I wandered around the north end of the Seward Beach Park for a while, watching the ships off in the distance.
Then I played with the timer setting on my camera, so I could run out and get in the shot. Like this out on a little jetty,
or this one out on the beach. (Like I said, it was a Thursday after Labor Day. There was no one around.)
I watched as the wave crashed on the seawall, and then walked along the seawall until I ran across this:
This is a memorial (there are a few) to the victims of the 1900 Hurricane (Isaac's Storm). If you don't know much about this storm, you should do some reading. Even post Katrina, it is still the deadliest natural disaster in the United States. And since I was there, Hurricane Ike plowed through.
One very cool thing about Galveston, is that even though it's only like 14 feet above sea level, that doesn't mean that people didn't take pride in their architecture. It's almost like even though they knew they were in harms way, they weren't going to let that force them into ugly or bland houses.
This is the Sacred Heart Catholic Church.
And this is the Bishop's Palace. It's as impressive as it looks. Really.
And here are just some random houses. 
Next time, Houston, and some not so grand architecture.
5 comments:
"Love the beach / hate the water" huh? :-)
I'm a love the beach / hate the sand kind of girl myself.
Beaches are gorgeous, but that mischievous, evil sand has a way of getting in all the wrong places. Grrrr. I hate that. Beaches would be sooooooo much better if they were covered in Astroturf.
I visited Houston about 1991 or so for work, and took a quick trip down to Galveston like you did. It was really pretty nice, and I don't imagine Houston has gotten any better with time...
That 1st pic with the wildflowers is absolutely gorgeous!!!
And I replied to your comment re: the diet on my blog. Check it out.
I've never been to Houston but I heard it's like the strip club capital of the world.
Nice to see that none of those pics are in your little montage....
Cora - As long as the sand stays where it belongs, I'm fine with it. If it starts making me feel "gritty" then I have issues. What I meant was that I was not remotely tempted to go for a swim.
SkyDad - Actually, the parts of Houston I was in seemed perfectly fine. Yeah, there's the oil industry, so there are refineries and what-not, but it wasn't Gary, IN.
JJ - Thanks. I will occasionally stop and smell the flowers. And go for the artsy-fartsy shot while I'm at it.
Candy - While T-Bone and I have been known to appreciate the beauty of the female body, we prefer to do it "out in the wild." Strip clubs (I've only been twice) feel too much like sad, sad zoos.
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