Adventure Location: Rockport, Texas
Adventure Date: 12/27/17
According to the OFM when it is cold, wet and windy outside like today, his mattress gets lonely and needs his warm large body on it a couple of times each day for an hour or so. We are not so sure he is telling the real story. So while he is doing his good deed for the mattress we are arranging the work needing to be done so he has PLENTY to keep him busy when he comes back to life.
Yesterday we went down to Padre Island National Seashore ( PINS ) and gathered a few million photographs. This afternoon we have it lined out for the OFM to cull and edit a few for tonight’s blog entry. We also have a small sledge hammer to talk to him with, if needed.
We arrived at the PINS Malaquite campground after lunch with the idea of shooting a couple of pictures of the campground. Forty pictures later we moved on to another area of the park for a later posting. GEEEEZ that camera trigger finger goes berserk sometimes.
So now we start at the first part of the Malaquite Campground area. The dump station is right before you go through the dunes to get to the camping area. It is well laid out with generous turning radius corners. Two rigs at a time can fit into the facility to take care of business.
The next thing you see as you continue is the sign telling you that you are in the right place. The campground is a long paved road to your left and right. Campsites are on both sides of the road. We have found that the maneuvering room is very adequate for the Castle and Sierra. There is turning loops at each end so you do not get dead ended in a nasty situation.
This is what a dune side campsite looks like. In this picture the beach is to the right.
The campsites are fairly large. On this day only one site was occupied on the dune side. We liked the dune side best when we have stayed here because the site is totally paved so no sand or stickers to contend with.
The beach side was mostly occupied. This next picture of one end of the beach side was taken from the grass line of the beach back toward the camping. This side has grass, sand and stickers to entertain you.
The beach front fishing is a year round item in this area. Usually there is some type of fish biting. Shark fishing is popular along the PINS beaches.
The restrooms have showers and toilets but keep in mind there is NO hot water supplied but they are cleaned daily. Here is the shower/restroom building and it is centrally located in the Malaquite camping area.
And here is look inside the rest room at the facilities available.
There is a nice couple of paths down to the beach from the campground. The visitor center is about a quarter mile from the campground so it is walk or bike distance by road or beach. Bike riding has lots of road to ride on and miles and miles of beach riding. Grocery stores etc are about 15 miles back toward Corpus Christi. All in all it is a rather nice place to spend a few days trying to have tooooo much fun..
Adventure Location: Rockport, Texas
Adventure Date: 12/25/17
The migraine has followed the normal 48 hour recuperation pattern and the OFM is doing well. Today was a nice lazy day so the OFM dug into his dwindling supply of pictures to get something to write about tonight.
Padre Island National Seashore ( PINS) has three kinds of camping available. The first we showed a couple of days ago is camping on the beaches. The OFM Teams do not do that type of camping.
The next camping is at Bird Island Basin (BIB). PINS is a long island with the Gulf of Mexico on one side and a bay named Laguna Madre on the other side. BIB is on the bay side. The first part you come to is the RV camping area. It is a long strip of sand right next to the water. RVs are parked in close together slots perpendicular to the waters edge. From the end of the slot to the water is about five feet most of the time. There is no water or electric or sewer at the campground. There is a nice outhouse in the area. There is water and a dump station over near the visitors center about four miles away. Check the website for cost and rules.
When you drive past the RV camping there is some day use parking and then a small parking loop that holds about twelve vehicles. This is the parking spot for the tent camping area. You have to carry your gear a few hundred feet to get onto the beach style area for tent camping.
There is an out house at the parking lot but no water, electric, or showers at the tenting area.
tenting area.
This is how close you can camp to the water. The view is looking south the length of Laguna Madre. Yes the tides here can move the water line a few feet from high to low.
From the tenting area you can look back toward the island and see some of the many dunes on the island. Many of them are really neat up close.
In another blog entry we will cover the paved RV campground. But a caution for all folks not familiar with this part of the coast. You will encounter mosquitoes, flies and lots of salt coating on your equipment. You will also have a wonderful opportunity to see the only place like this left on the earth. PINS is the least developed barrier island in the world. Yes it is a place really worth visiting at least once. The Teams do not recommend June, July, August or September due to the heat and humidity. However if you enjoy any kind of beach activity this is definitely one of the better places for trying to have tooooo much fun.
Adventure Location: Rockport, Texas
Adventure Date: 12/24/17
The really bad migraine hit yesterday afternoon and the headache is still very evident. That did not stop the OFM Teams from getting around to Meander the neighborhood slowly.
The Rockport Art Center garden was the location of a few pictures and a little walking. The hurricane damages is slowly being cleaned up here but it has a good way to go yet. This palm tree had gotten leaned way over. Apparently the powers that be decided it needed to be cut off and hauled away.
We think it would have looked pretty neat arching over the sidewalk. Maybe the stump agrees because it seems to be crying over the event.
As we meandered along the path we could see the damage was minimal at most locations. At another seemingly undamaged palm the center looked funny to us.
On closer inspection it seemed to have something odd clustered around the center. It was not identifiable by any of the Team Members.
We meandered on along the nice paved path to the end of the path where there was a bush trying to bloom to show it was not defeated by a little breeze like a 140 mph hurricane. One tough bush we decided.
We meandered down by the water and it is very low from the north winds. The bottom was clearly visible but the OFM was clearly not with it since he did not take a picture. It proved to be a nice walk and a welcome visit to the garden. As usual the area around the harbor is a nice place for trying to have tooooo much fun.
Adventure Location: Rockport, Texas
Adventure Date: 12/22/17
First you lay your nice fishing rod up against the rear fender of Sierra. Next you open the door and get some rigging out. Then you step away from the door for some sunlight to see better with your old eyes. Then you jump when the wind slams the door shut. Next you turn around to see your newly door customized two piece fishing rod.
Next you carefully pick up the rod and try to control the broken graphite shards flapping around. Then you carefully stab a shard into your left hand pointer finger to make a point.
Next you pull out your multi tool and open the very sharp blade to try to get the shard of graphite out of your throbbing finger. The edge of your knife makes a razor seem dull, so you are being very careful by bracing your finger on the truck fender. It is not a big shard but your sharp knife could easily make it a big cut.
Eventually you get the shard dug out of your finger and wash the cut with some drinking water that is chlorinated. Yes it hurts a lot.......x@%#&((^$%xx. Then you dry it off with your well used fishing towel. Sit back on the truck bumper for a few minutes to recover your senses before you head to the water to fish.
And that is how you start off a great fishing trip where you never even get one nibble. Don’t you just love fishing.
A couple of days ago the Teams took a picture of the crowd of beach campers on the Padre Island NP beach.
You do have to be careful about how soft the beach sand is according to some of our readers. It does not seem too crowded to us. For some folks camping on a salt water beach is a lot of fun.
The latest change in the saga of OFM Adventures happened today. The OFM turned notice canceling his reservations in Rockport, Texas for year 2018 in order to have a base camp established. As of today we are back into rolling mode as the mood and weather allows.
We checked our records and found we were stagnant in two different campgrounds for ten months total of 2017. We are not content with that style of RVing. As of today we have reservations here in Rockport until Feb. 1. Our plan is to roll somewhere no later that Feb.1. Weather (cold) is holding us until late January. That also gives the OFM time to check out some new to us locations for trying to have tooooo much fun.
Adventure Location: Rockport, Texas
Adventure Date: 12/20/17
Sierra had an appointment with the vehicle doctor today to take care of a recall on its “electric power steering”. We got there right on time this morning. The dealer was busy but prompt and we were reprogrammed and gone 43 minutes later.
So here we are on the road way before we thought we would be. Now what---of course we meander! Our first stop was Cove Harbor. It caught a major hit from Hurricane Harvey. We stopped by to see how the boat clean up is going. It is going but that is one unreal pile of boats yet to be cleared.
However one guard in the boat launch area was very alert and ready for action.
The cleaning table guard was wide awake and carefully eyeballing everything that that came near. Don’t mess with this guard, you would regret it.
The meandering for a while was not productive of blog topics, but when we got to the Rockport Beach that changed. It was a bright sunny bikini type day. Quite a few folks were out beaching around and enjoying the sunshine and salt air.
Others were out playing in the water having a grand old time this Christmas week. Still others were out paddling paddle boards and kayaks from the beach front. These two folks were steady at it the whole time the Teams were meandering around inside the park.
The beach crew was very busy setting tall new poles for something. They were steadily moving dirt and and pouring concrete.
We asked at the entrance when the park is scheduled to open to full service again vs this restricted free entry we have right now. The answer: Hopefully some time in January.
The beach park is definitely a good location for trying to have tooooo much fun.
Adventure Location: Rockport, Texas
Adventure Date: 12/19/17
We have been having really interesting fog events the last two days and the idiot OFM had been forgetting his camera. So finally today we got a nice picture of the fog closing in on a private fishing pier in Fulton.
A few minutes later the pier was not visible. Then shortly later the whole cloud just vanished in a few seconds. The sun came out and it was 74 and bright hot sun. Tee shirts and shorts were the dress of preference most of the day.
A big chunk of the day was spent wondering the best way and time to run around touring some scenic locations. What scenic locations? These were a couple of the locations in consideration.
This is the road to Guadalupe Mountains NP. There are about 4000 scenic pictures along those roads.
Then inside the park are walking trails all over the place and some of them are pretty nice little walks like this one above.
Part of the time the OFM piddled with some colored pencils on the back of a sheet of paper that had been a scratch sheet. He managed to put together this hint of a drawing set down at the beach.
When it was finally time for supper he decided to try his hand a cooking for a change. The stir fry sausage came out really well. It was good enough he licked the plate TWICE.
And tonight the Internet in the campground is working so there is a new blog post about his efforts at trying to have tooooo much fun in the sun.
Adventure Location: Rockport, Texas
Adventure Date: 12/17/17
The OFM had shopping chores to do this morning but somehow he managed to spend some time down near the beach taking some pictures. He still has a natural laziness meanderingness that controls him.
One interesting item is this post that was installed a few years ago. It has aged badly on the seaward side. As you can see the constant battle with the salt water is a losing cause. But to our surprise, even though the post is at the water and open to the bay, Hurricane Harvey did NO damage to it.
The tides are running a couple of feet low. That gives a view of some rocks that we normally dodge with our lures while fishing. As the OFM looked across the seldom viewable sand, he noticed this particular rock. WOW, that rock looks like a puppy dog coming out of the sand. Sure enough the rest of the Teams could see the suggested image also. We hope our readers can also see the image of the dog looking to the left in the rock.
In spite of the miserable cold a neighbor went out wade fishing today and brought home three nice speckled trout that he planned on having for supper. We guess that wading in the water in cold weather is another great way of trying to have tooooo much fun?
Adventure Location: Rockport, Texas
Adventure Date: 12/156/2017
After that picture of the good looking woman in yesterday’s blog, today’s content will be quite a smash we are certain.
The Teams were out meandering with the OFM Camera just collecting future blog material for our fun. Just before lunch time we decided to check on a friends new shade shelter on her new home. We pulled into the drive way and she and a few others the Teams know were busy working. The Teams helped by staying out of the way.
A couple of doors down from here is a lot that had a badly damaged mobile home on it. Hurricane Harvey had done a bad number on it. The authorities had gotten the old home pulled out and put next to the road. Then a new home was put into place and hooked up. Now there was time to wait on the big clean up. That was several weeks ago around the first of November.
There has been so much clean up to do in the area that priorities were assigned and the trash pile awaits it turn. The OFM has been very pleased at the continuous good performance of the clean -up effort.
Today was that old mutilated mobile home’s turn to be cleaned up. It was about a 16x60 that had huge holes punched through it by falling trees. In just a few minutes the crane had the walls down and all the topworks above the frame piled up and veing loaded into the debris truck.
The OFM went back to Sierra and grabbed the camera just in time to get this shot of the debris being loaded. That operator was good at it and moved a lot of trash in a hurry.
The OFM turned away to talk to his friend. With in seconds a loud crash bag happened in the street. Everyone looked back to see the equipment operator grab the frame of the former mobile home and fold it up like an old cereal box. Then he folded it a few times more until it was a wad of junk steel. He used the equipment to carry the former large massive frame over to the pile that was waiting for the debris truck to return.
Then the equipment operator went to work smoothing out the ditch and road shoulder to be smooth and ready for grass to be allowed to grow. The OFM casually meandered over to the squashed frame for this good bye picture.
It may have been just our imagination but it seemed that the operator had a big grin on his face while smashing this stuff into little pieces. We were wondering if he was trying to have tooooo much fun.
Adventure Location: North Alabama
Adventure Date: 12/15/2017
It seems to the OFM Teams that Ms Piper really understands that having tooooo much fun idea.
Adventure Location: Sinton, Texas
Adventure Date: 12/13-14/2017
The OFM was not feeling his best and could not figure out why. A trip to the wonderfully healing Welder Park in Sinton, Texas was taken to get in some kicking back and peacefulness. It is about a thirty minute trip from the Castle and the trip is through the cropland and windmills. It is a drier climate and usually softer air than the wet coastal salt laden environment.
Sierra got us there and parked amongst the trees that are all over this park. There is a couple of miles of nice walking paths and another large chunk of land for just plain old meandering. It turned out to be a good day for meandering for the body and the mind.
Notice the huge are behind Sierra for meandering. There is an area at least as large and tree smothered behind the photographer. The Teams have camped in the campground here a few times in the past and it was very nice back then.
A big orange ball was in the crotch of a live oak tree we noticed. It was bigger than a basket ball. A close up with the camera did not reveal enough detail to be sure exactly what it was. We are guessing some sort of fungi.
As we wandered around the park, we noticed lots of piles of wires and electrical boxes scattered in a rough pattern.
It seemed to be some sort of underground surveying equipment. This is a significant oil producing area around here. If you recognize the equipment and what it is used for please let us know what it is for.
It ended up being a great relaxing time for the Teams. But the OFM was not finished yet.
When we were leaving Alabama we gave Beautiful Bike back to The OFM’s DIL. It was just to nice a bike to take it down here to the coast and let the salt air ruin it. Since then the OFM has been trying to decide whether to get another kayak or another bike.
Today he decided he would rather have a bike to use everywhere and not have to worry about damage by the elements. So we thought it out and decided we wanted a lesser costly bike to join the Teams. The OFM feels the Teams will get a lot more use and fun from a bike than a kayak now days.
Some research was put into the consideration and then a trip today to look at good but not expensive bikes. Academy Sports was chosen as the first stop. The OFM perused the large quantity of bikes available. None of them was just right. But just right would cost several dollars more. So a couple of hard choices were made and this black bike came home with us.
We will be accessorizing it to fit our desires over the next few weeks. It was $140 drive out and fits the OFM body very well. We did not want the suspension part of the bike but that was a concession we felt the OFM could live with. It does not have the super low gearing we wanted but maybe the OFM does not need to be going into places needing super low gearing any more. It will be a great adventure addition to the OFM current abilities. And most likely will be a considerable factor in many trying to have tooooo much fun adventures.
Adventure Location: Rockport Beach, Texas
Adventure Date: 12/2017
It was a beautiful morning a few days ago and the OFM Photography Team was out chasing pictures early. We were finding lots of pictures to take and even a few that have resided in the blog already. Naturally the OFM was meandering in places most folks don’t go, like on his knees or fat belly on the wet beach sand. That fool will do nearly anything to get “the picture”.
Well what in the world has his attention so intently. Sea grasses washed up on the Rockport Beach did. Now and then we would see some dohicky or bauble of interest for a second but mostly it was thin hunting for pictures on the beach that morning.
As we reached the far end of the mile long beach, the sea grasses had been washed ashore and arranged for us to admire. This was the first sight that caught his attention. He was still on his feet but squatted down to maximum pain level to take this nice overall picture of the scene. Notice how close the water is to the grasses.
One squat like that served notice that the OFM would not be doing another one like it for a long time. So after that, any low pictures were taken with straight knees but not necessarily vertical legs.
This next picture was about ten feet away and reminded us of some grass covered rolling hills in Oregon near the John Day River. That is some fantastic country to see up there in Oregon.
Anyway he clambered down safely to the horizontal on the damp sand. Carefully the salty sand was kept out of the camera and a few pictures taken. Apparently he was a wiggle wort that morning and only this shot was not too fuzzy.
From down on the sand he noticed a slightly different view of the grasses. So he wallowed his fat tummy around like a happy wart hog and lined up for another shot.
Click/splash happened about the same moment as a small wave washed up onto his feet and legs. He jumped and squealed like a stuck wart hog. The Teams found it a lot more amusing than he did. Here is the picture. You nice folks tell us if it was worth the “excitement” to get the shot or not.
The mile or so back to Sierra was not as pleasant as the mile to the “incident” location. When we returned to the Castle the OFM was ready for dry warm socks. Sometimes you just have to climb right down into it to get the picture. The Teams feel that that is when you are enjoying the most about trying to have tooooo much fun.
Adventure Location: North Alabama
Adventure Date: 12/11/2017
Is that Arthur baking a cake for me! Oh Wow we are going to have a party and try to have tooooo much fun!
Adventure Location: North Alabama
Adventure Date: 12/10/2017
How about a picture of Grandson Gavin helping bake a cake for a celebration.
It sure looks like he was trying to have tooooo much fun.
Adventure Location: Rockport,Texas
Adventure Date: 12/08/2017
There is something basically very WRONG with snow on a palm tree on the Texas coast.
That picture was taken after most of the snow in the area had melted away. It is just WRONG.
Here is our site after about 1000 this morning. Most of the flat areas around here had about a 1 1/2 inch thickness of snow. It was a wet snow and did not brush away easily. The OFM wanted it off of the Castle so he went around brushing it off with the brush for washing the Castle. It worked pretty well on the sides.
Here is a good enlargement to show why the solar panels were not generating electricity.
When he saw this the OFM decided to head up the rear ladder and clean as much of the snow off the roof as he easily could. The rest of the Teams members were hoping that the softened ground would help cushion the impact when that idiot fell from the icy/wet roof. But we had a major surprise when the OFM was careful enough to get 90% of the snow knocked to the ground and himself back on the ground with no bodily injury at all.
When we got the gear put away and back into the Castle, the solar controllers were both giving us wonderful little green blinks as they worked at refilling the low batteries. With 3 1/2 days of heavy clouds/rain the batteries were getting down to only about 20% charge remaining and they were thirsty.
That left a lot of the day for the OFM to continue his big decision he has been working on. After a little over ten years of fairly active on the road RVing he is trying to choose what he wants to do. He has been virtually every where he wanted to see at least twice.
A couple of his friends that were on the road for a decade or so has been e-mailing him with answers to his questions. This has been going on for a couple of months. Today the OFM made a first tiny step choice and requested a site here in Rockport for the year of 2018. This will be our “homebase”. For 2018 we plan to have trips out and about when the fishing and beach combing is not at its best. Those trips may be with the Castle or just motel camping. We will be checking what fits with the OFM’s current attitude.
We know from the last years experiences that by just driving Sierra we can go better than twice as far in a day as we can towing the Castle. Sierra gets 9.9 mpg towing and 20+ mpg without the Castle. There is a lot of territory the OFM is not interested in looking at again so we may even fly over to some place and rent a car there to look around or do some activity. The OFM traveled like this during his five years working in Washington State. It was a pretty good way of seeing places of interest. We do not know for sure what the Teams will do but you can be sure OFM Adventures will continue and the Teams will be doing their best at trying to have tooooo much fun.
Adventure Location: Rockport,Texas
Adventure Date: 12/07/2017
The good news is that the Man O War sting has finished with the OFM and he is doing well from that event. The bad news is that winter arrived about 1600 that day and has been an unwelcome visitor. The weather radar stays the same all day and night except the storm does roam around.
The ducks are wearing arctic parkas and insulated rubber boots. The people are wanting to move farther south. It's the normal winter weather here. Drizzle cold rain, 20 mph wind to move the drizzle sideways, no sign of the sun and folks moving quickly when they HAVE to go outside.
Maybe we are lucky that ice is a never to be seen item on the roads. The OFM is wearing more clothes than he did when he left Washington in October of 2007. Yep, the six weeks of winter down here is not very nice. Wet cold is bad enough but this soggy drippy sloppy soaked air cold is very miserable. When your Frogg Togg rain suit soaks through you know it is not nice.
Meanwhile the OFM has a scratchy throat, draining sinus, headachy and a generally viral feeling to help his attitude. We think he left his”trying to have tooooo much fun” somewhere in the sun a few days ago.
UPDATE 2:30 FRIDAY MORNING
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| SNOW |
Adventure Location: Rockport,Texas
Adventure Date: 12/05/2017
It was a busy morning and the OFM was keyed into the chores in front of us. After a couple of hours he had the goals of today accomplished and decided to stop at the harbor and catch a few fish.
At the harbor was a few Portuguese Man o War critters floating around.
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| ABOUT 8 INCHES LONG |
We are very familiar with them from the years that have been spent on the Gulf of Mexico shores. avoiding them is the best thing to do. They have very long tough tentacles that hand down from the balloon. Read this article to get the real information on the details. Man o War article.
The tentacles that hang down have a very powerful sting that will make you remember them forever. It looks like 20# light blue monofilament fishing line with little blue balls on it. The OFM thought he had hung a broken off fishing line and brought the end up to his reel to try to break the line off closer to the rock it likely was wrapped around.
He laid the line on the back of his left hand fingers in preparation to wrapping it around the hand to pull and break the line. As he stopped it from moving he noticed the little blue balls on the line. then the panic hit him squarely between the eyes. It was a man o war tentacle. He slung it off his hand just about the moment the severe pain hit. His rod was dropped and he moved as quickly to a nearby water faucet and flushed his fingers well with the water for a couple of minutes. Then he slung his hand as dry as he could and went back to collect his rod and head for the Castle.
In the mean time the red lines were getting bolder across the back of his hand. The OFM had been stung before during his shrimp catching days and knew what was coming and it was not a pleasant thought.
We arrived back at the Castle and the OFM went to work cleaning his hand WITHOUT RUBBING. We got his hand cleaned pretty well and then loosely, DO NOT RUB IT IN, applied some Benadryl cream to the stung area. Now all there was left to do is endure the pain for a half hour or so until all the toxins were used up.
Sure enough right on time, an hour later, the pain began to ease off. What kind of pain was it you ask? Imagine a red hot coat hanger held across your fingers and applied vigorously. It is not something to try just for the experience. About two hours after the initial pain, the pain was gone. There is a couple of light red marks to indicate where the attack occurred.
The Teams figured that the OFM needed a special supper for being such a big boy about the incident so they fixed him a large bowl of shrimp and salad items. He ate it like it was very good. A cup of hot tea topped of the meal and he was a happy fat man again.
Please be careful around those Man O War critters. There is nothing about them that is any good for trying to have tooooo much fun.
Adventure Location: Rockport,Texas
Adventure Date: 12/01/2017
All pictures are click enlargeable
Sometimes a photograph is taken of something that turns out to be not worth the electrons. Then other times the object of the photograph is not worth an electron but the things in the area are really worth the electrons and time to ready them for publication in the blog.
On this day this photograph was taken from a pier with the camera about eight feet above the water. The water was about three feet deep. The rock these critters were on is on the bottom of the bay. The camera was at its maximum optical zoom. What the photo was taken to show we have no idea. Most experienced photographers learn to relish these happy accidents and run with them. The OFM is so incompetent that when a happy accident happens he dances like the fool he is that something neat was photographed.
Cropping and some color balancing was all that was done to this picture. Here is the first cropping from the original picture.
The critter grouping looked pretty cute to us as it sat on the computer. Then the OFM began to play with the cropping and other keys he should stay away from. Suddenly he messed up and got this next shot where the minnows really came out in force. Wow that is different in appearance. He messed with the “color balance” slider and finally decided on this as a neat picture and wasted some more electrons.
And it was nice also. Now he began to wonder what those shelled critters are. So he looked around a bit on the Internet but he wasn’t smart enough to figure out anything. So if a reader knows what they are please comment.
Now that he had pushed that limit and got lucky the OFM fiddled with more keys. It is a really good thing this program has a fantastic “UNDO” magic key. He finally cropped down to this last picture and did a bit of color balancing to make it look more natural. Now we have a good closeup of an unknown monster ready to pounce and eat us.
And he still has no idea what the identity of the critter is. We feel like this is a pretty good enlargement from a picture taken in those circumstances. We are definitely sure the Teams had tooooo much fun taking the picture at the Rockport Beach near the swimmers.
Adventure Location: Rockport,Texas
Adventure Date: 12/02/2017
All pictures are clickable.
The OFM was walking across the Walmart parking lot in the dark just minding his business when the explosions happened. Three significant ground shaking explosions with intense flashes of bright light vibrated everything around him. His combat infantry history kicked in with great vigor. From the dirty asphalt he frantically searched the surrounding area for where the trouble was! The gorgeous fireworks that showed up next from about two blocks away were a wonderful relief. He was afraid it was a terrorist attack or something bad wrong like LPG tanks exploding.
After his heart slowed down and he got up, he was able to watch the show over the trees. He certainly would like to have know it was going to happen. The bright moon and the bright fireworks made for some nice viewing. He was wishing he had the camera with him but it was safe back in the Castle.
On to calmer things now. There are still a few flowers around the beach area in spite of Hurricane Harvey blowing most of them away. Here is a tough little flower that withstood Harvey and is standing proud right near the boat ramp. Most of the vegetation in the area of the boat ramp took a severe beating from the water and wind. However now we are three months since Harvey went away and even the beat up plants and trees are well into recovery.
During our walks around this area we are accumulating some neat photographs. They will be presented as they are processed and ready for viewing.
This next picture was taken looking down into the water from a pier. The water was very clear and this jellyfish was messing around next to the bottom in about three feet of water. The Teams were surprised at how well the picture turned out.
Another time we were walking along and some debris came floating by. The OFM grabbed a few shots of the stuff with particular attention to the feather floating amongst the debris. He cropped the photograph and thought it came out a nice photo in spite of him. You be the judge.
Another time the OFM was walking along a bulkhead checking the water and bottom for anything interesting. A nice female blue crab came easing along being crabby. She saw the OFM and maneuvered this way and that and the OFM just followed along. Of the several pictures taken this one was chosen to display.
How can you tell it is a female? It is easy the females blue crabs have the tip of their pincers painted with fingernail polish. Or at least the tips look like it. Look at the very tip of the orange claws and notice the dark red polish on them.
Can you imagine how simple minded the OFM must be when he considered looking at a crab a way of trying to have tooooo much fun?
