Categories
Ocean Road Travel

Lovely Gulf Coast

Me and my Camry on the Beach
Several years ago I took this very picture at this very spot. Obviously I liked the way my traveling companion could be perched up high on a sand dune. Want to see the old version? Write me!

I’ve had this silly idea about driving the perimeter of the continental United States. It’s not been something I focused on seriously until one day I realized I’d driven about 90% of it. “Wow!” I thought “So why not make it a goal to finish?” A quick inventory identified a gaping hole: the Texas Gulf Coast.

So into the fabric of this trip I wove a drive from Port Arthur to Brownsville. This included places like famous Galveston island with it’s amazing beaches and horrendous weather history. Corpus Christi and the fabulous coastline of Mustang Island. Also included was the Padre Island National Seashore which was on a separate list too, that of visiting all National Parks. Nothing like killing two birds with one stone!

Let me first clear a misconception I’d heard from people to whom I’ve told the story of my quest. Roads in this country don’t drive along the beach or along the edge of the Canadian and Mexican border. 

The coastline in particular is erratic. While you can drive fairly close to much of the western coastline, the story is different along the east and gulf coasts. Due to a mix of private coastal property in the northeast, bayous in the south, and undrivable sandbars  in the east, much of the rest of the country’s eastern and southern coastline can only be visited as you drive at a distance down the seaboard. The Great Lakes have more a character of the west coast. 

As for the land borders, there’s little reason for the highways to be at border’s edge. Much more common is that the highways follow along the railway lines of the deep south and the high north. US Hwy 2, for instance, follows the old Great Northern railway line from Everett, WA to Sault Ste Marie, MI usually just a few miles from the Canadian border but not right on it. 

So back to the Texas Gulf Coast. I’d like to share my impressions.

I found the drive to consist of three general characters: idilic coastline, vast flatlands, and industrial wastelands. The beaches could be stunning as I saw in Galveston, Mustang Island, Padre Island and elsewhere. When I couldn’t get to shore because roads only extended to the coastline and not along it, I found the driving to be long stretches of either wild or farmed land but all of it remarkably flat. Then there was the regular punctuation of refineries, rail yards, platforms, ship yards, etc. which were so important to the gulf coast oil industry but are such an eyesore. 

Gulf Coast National Seashore
Idilic Coastline: Gulf Coast Seashore
Biking in Galveston
Idilic Coastline: Galveston pier
Padre Island National Seashore
Idilic Coastline: Padre Island National Seashore
Boca Chica Beach
Idilic Coastline: Southmost Point
Gulf Coast
Industrial Wastelands: Drilling Platforms
Gulf Coast
Industrial Wastelands: Ship Yards
Gulf Coast
Industrial Wastelands: Industrial Ports
Gulf Coast
Industrial Wastelands: Refineries
Biking in Galveston
Industrial Wastelands: Dry Docks
Coastal Flatlands
Vast Flatlands
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By TravisGood

Speaker. Maker. Writer. Traveler. Father. Husband.

MakerCon Co-Chair (MakerCon.com)
Maker City San Diego Roundtable Member
San Diego Maker Faire Producer (SDMakerFaire.org)

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