Re: Travel report

Posted by Kurt Maurer on Jul 25, 2004

George, that sounded like a fantastic little trip, thanks for the report. I sure wish I could come up there and spend a few weeks with y'all... it's dangnear too hot to fish 'round these parts anymore. Of course, that never stops us.

Anyway, here's my trip report from yesterday, Saturday the 24th:

Leslie and I sling the yaks on the raks and fire up Pee Wee The Wonder Truck, then head out for the wilds of the San Bernard Nat'l Wildlife Refuge for a "combo package" outing: birding for her, and fishing for me. There's a peak tide with weakish currents happening around noon, winds are from the SE at 10-15 (so what else is new?), and a cold front has temps dipping into the low 140's.

We plan to leave by 0800, which means we clear the driveway at 1030. By noon we hit Angleton, where the antique shops are having a parking lot extravaganza. We stop, of course, and after three hours and two heat strokes are back in the truck sporting a brand new set of ancient old bear claw corn spears. Hey, they were only $12...

At West Columbia there is another antique shop where Leslie once found some book or another that was really, really cool, but can't remember what it was, exactly; but needs to stop in again to make sure she doesn't miss anything important this go-round. The shop is situated in one of the town's older buildings, a mud mound built by Karankawa Indians in 1216 B.C. It has no air conditioning, of course (native peoples couldn't afford the bills then), and the place is like an oven. Leslie is careful indeed not to miss any opportunities to own fragments of history, but finds nothing in an hour and a half of close inspection. We emerge from the shop at last, wring our clothes to mere sopping wetness, then note that I now weigh 110 pounds, and Leslie 80. This is somewhat curious, since just this morning I weighed 165, and Leslie, errr... say, did I tell you about how nice the weather was?

It is now dinnertime, and we were famished. So we divert to our favorite rural cafe, curiously located at the Brazoria County Airport, where recently a small airplane was stolen by a drunk teenager at 0300 in the morning, flown into a set of high voltage transmission lines two miles off the end of the runway, flopped totally wrecked into a Texas Prison farm field, and left our young hero, who walked the rest of his way home, completely and utterly uninjured (this is a true fact, by the way). Leslie orders the large fried shrimp, and I the large fried oysters, and we swap morsels while sipping 12 gallons of ice water.

It takes a couple hours to get home, and when we finally arrive and begin unloading the truck I said "hey, we never even thought about the kayaks today." Leslie said, "yeah well, I was hoping you wouldn't, because I really wasn't in the mood for paddling anyway. It's too hot."

Cheers, Kurt

In Response to: Travel report by George on Jul 24, 2004

Replies:

• Re: Travel report by Doug Judd on Jul 25, 2004
• Re: Travel report by George on Jul 25, 2004