Credit Card Works Again

Rockport, Texas

Laundry then play in Sneaky the Yak the rest of the day WAS the plan. Right off the start the campground laundry was backed up. The one down the street was standing room for waiting only. Ok head back to the Castle and take Sneaky out first.

Of course a weather radar check is smart since there are clouds on the horizon. OH NO look at all that red, yellow and orange on the radar screen. Never mind. Some internet searching for the next general direction to roll was the actual event this morning.

Later a check of the campground laundry proved fruitful. All the laundry was grabbed and hurried on over to the laundry room. It turns out everyone else was finished for the day and all the time needed and then some was available. Now all the clothing is put away. The radar is still not nice enough for me to go out in a boat.

More research on the next location to roll. About four pm a weather alert popped up for a tornado about six miles from the Castle. My feet insisted we get over to the concrete block office to sit around for a little while. There was plenty of dark skies around that there was not a chance Sneaky the Yak would be leaving the campground.

Finally it was give up and find some supper time. AH Ha go to Whataburger and try the credit card and see if the issuer has fixed their mess up. Yep they had. During supper the dark clouds were watched as they moved around like a massive dance in the sky. Definitely not small boat weather. Speaking of boats, how about a tour of the harbor was the thought.

The harbor turned out to be pretty neat. The odd overall color in the pictures is exactly what the lighting was like with the dancing dark clouds over head. There are some long piers in the harbor that wind around like a drunk rope. This picture of the Maritime Museum ended up having several stories in it.
The red building on the right is a bait house. This particular pier leaves the bulkhead just to the right of the bait house. Notice the water running out of the pipes from the bait house. They have tanks holding live shrimp, mullet and croaker. The water is run through the tanks 24/7 to keep all the bait frisky.

The Museum in the back has added a large addition to it and the OFM has been negligent about getting in there to see the new things. It was a great place when it was toured in Jan 08.

Notice the sail boat moored at the dock. The rent for a slip is $375 a month including water, electric, sewage pumping and use of the toilet and showers over in the parking lot. This information came from a live aboard fellow who was out enjoying the cool 88 degree evening. He was waiting for the fuel dock to open tomorrow to fill up with about 600 gallons of diesel and head down south toward Mexico. These folks are the water borne equivalent of Rvers like me.

Back to the sailboat. Check out this picture.
Moss on the boat is a new one on me. The poor sail boat had it growing all over the topside. The in the water portion was not any better. It had barnacles and weeds a couple of inches thick on the hull under the water. What a mess that will be to clean up!!

On out on the pier were lots of nice and not so nice boats. Here is one that looked ok from the pier and is waiting for YOU to buy it. Not me, my boats no longer use motors that are not human and a kayak paddle would not do much good on this one.
On another full timers boat was the owners attempt to produce electricity when in gunk holing mode (boon docking in rv terms). It looked like a 100 watt solar panel and a wind generator of unknown size. They should be able to get by ok on that much electricity normally.
Since it has been very hot, a lot of boaters have purchased small window unit air conditioners. Then they fabricate some sort of ducting to get the cool air into the boat. Some were nicer than other, but here is one example of a solution.
After all this it was getting pretty dim with more clouds closing in. The cooler air was nice. Getting some serious rain would have been better. It was still a great day for trying to have tooooo much fun. TheOFM