TEXAS, HOUSTON: THE GRAFFITI BUILDING AND SHIPLEY DO-NUTS

 November 29, 2021

Bob knows I love street art/good graffiti, and somehow he found out about the Houston Graffiti Building, located near downtown Houston, and added it to our itinerary. A bunch of old industrial buildings have been "repurposed" as an outdoor art museum. There don't appear to be businesses inside these buildings as the parking lot only had the cars of the people who came to take pictures of the art. 

I don't think any of the art is meant to be permanent, and the pictures I have found online of this site are different than the ones I took, but this is how I will remember our visit. I don't think too many words are needed--just enjoy.

This video shows the front section parallel to the parking lot. From here we circumnavigated the complex until we returned to the parking lot.

TEXAS, HOUSTON: RICE UNIVERSITY AND THE HOUSTON ZOO

November 29, 2021

Since we were flying home out of Houston, we spent our last day of our Southern Texas trip there and managed to cram quite a bit in.

We began the day with a drive-by visit to Rice University. The average GPA for admission to this elite private school is 4.12. It has an acceptance rate of 8-10% and an impressive graduation rate of 95%, which I would guess is due in part to the 6:1 student-faculty ratio. About 7,200 students attend Rice, with about 55% of those being undergrads and 45% being grad students. Tuition is $51,000+ for undergrads.

In his travel agenda for our trip, Bob noted that every incoming freshman is placed in one of Rice's eleven residential colleges, somewhat like Hogwarts houses, where they live, dine, and socialize. 

Less than a mile away from Rice is the Houston Zoo, a 55-acre park with over 600 species of animals. It is relatively small in comparison to zoos like New York City's Bronx Zoo (265 acres), the National Zoo in Washington D.C. (163 acres), or the San Diego Zoo (100 acres), but Wikipedia says it is the second most visited zoo in the United States, or at least it was in 2017.

Cute door handles. (Can you see Bob in the reflection?)

They already had Christmas decorations up, which added some festivity to our visit:

TEXAS, GALVESTON, PART 2 -- A SEGWAY TOUR, GOOD FOOD, AND WINDOW SHOPPING

 November 27-28, 2021

One thing I should mention is that Galveston is an island of about 212 square miles and with a population of around 355,000. It's a popular tourist destination and had about 7 million visitors last year. I can understand why. I had a lot of fun there! And while it didn't have any bird sanctuaries, I think Bob enjoyed it as well.

1. SEGWAY TOUR

We had scheduled a Segway tour for the 27th, but a storm had moved in and we had to reschedule for the next day. We met our guide at 9:00 AM and discovered that we were the only people on the tour!  We chose our helmets, had a quick training session on how to operate our Segways, and were off! We spent the next 2 1/2 hours rolling around Galveston and learning all about the city. It was a blast.

We learned that before the 1900 hurricane, Galveston was the financial center of the United States. It was the main entry/trade port in the United States, and it had the most millionaires of any city in America. After the city was wiped out by the hurricane, however, the financial center moved north (and far away from hurricanes) to New York City.

The last vestiges of those days are the incredible number of well-preserved or restored elaborate Victorian homes. We live in a town full of similar Victorian homes of the same era, so it was really fun to roll around and look at dozens of them. I wonder how many of them were built or rebuilt post-hurricane and how many actually survived the hurricane? I'm sure our guide told us, but I can't remember.

TEXAS: GALVESTON, PART I -- A MOVIE, A BOOK, AND TWO MUSEUMS

November 27, 2021

I have to confess that whenever I hear "Galveston," the first thing that comes to mind is this song by Glen Campbell:

The next thing I think of is the book Isaac's Storm by Erik Larson, one of my favorite authors. This book tells the story of the monster hurricane that hit Galveston on September 8, 1900. It was the deadliest natural disaster in United States history. (More on the hurricane later.)

The book tells the story of Isaac Cline, the meteorologist who severely underestimated the power of the approaching storm. His wife Cora, who was pregnant with their fourth child, died in the disaster, and Cline himself and his other three children barely escaped alive.

On our first day in Galveston, we went to a small movie theater at Pier 21 that shows a documentary entitled The Great Storm. In addition to this book, the film was a great way to be introduced to the event that completely altered the history of this city, which prior to 1900 was the Wall Street/financial center of the United States.

We also discovered "Old Galveston," the beautiful historic homes and buildings that survived the storm or were rebuilt/restored. Our first exposure to these homes was the Dealey Children's Home, built by a local businessman in 1894-1895 as an orphanage. Sadly, it was destroyed in the storm of 1900. However, newspaper publisher William Randolph Hearst hosted a charity bazaar at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in New York City to raise funds for rebuilding, and the current building was completed in 1902. It now houses the Bryan Museum of Texas history.

TEXAS: CORPUS CHRISTI AREA, PART II (ARANSAS WILDLIFE REFUGE, TREE TOP SIDEWALK, WHOOPING CRANES, AND SPOONBILLS)

 Friday, November 26, 2022

We spent the morning at Aransas National Wildlife Refuge, a 115,324-acre protected area on the Gulf Coast. It was established in 1937 as a refuge and breeding ground for migratory birds and other wildlife.

One of my favorite parts of the refuge was this tree top observation boardwalk that zigzags to a 40-foot-tall observation tower.

It is a design masterpiece, taking us from the understory, through the midstory, and above the top story. Educational material is found along the way.

TEXAS: CORPUS CHRISTI AREA, PART I (THANKSGIVING DAY, PADRE ISLAND, PORT ARANSAS NATIONAL PRESERVE)

 Thursday, November 25, 2021 (Thanksgiving Day)

It's hard for me to be away from home, family, and friends on a holiday, although it doesn't seem to bother Bob at all. It was especially strange to be the Gulf Coast for Thanksgiving. NOTHING about the Gulf Coast says Thanksgiving to me. We didn't even see wild turkeys there.

We left Houston at 6:30 PM on Wednesday night, heading for the Corpus Christi area, a distance of just over 200 miles. Bob was worried that we would hit Thanksgiving traffic, and rain seemed to be imminent, so his anxiety was high. 

But neither heavy traffic nor rain materialized, and we made good time.

In the morning we drove to North Padre Island, a barrier island along the coast.

The road took us right onto the beach, where we drove on the sand along the shoreline. The rising sun broke through the clouds, giving us a pretty start to our day of thanksgiving.

We saw lots of pelicans, egrets, and other seabirds hanging out on the shore.