Peggy in Fort Bend County Line, Texas
Out of the motel around 9:00AM this morning headed back West and South on Beltway 8 again this morning trying to get around Houston. Houston is one big city. I understand it is the Fourth largest city in the US. I like the traffic flow though, but we did lose Beltway 8 and had to stop and ask (I hate to do that). Got directions and found I should have changed to Interstate 610 when Beltway 8 disappeared. On Interstate 610 we proceeded on to Highway 59 headed to Victoria. First stop was at the Fort Bend County line for an ABC's of Touring picture and then on to the Victoria County line for another picture. It was our intention to stop at the Harley Davidson dealer in Victoria, but he was closed. So we continued on Highway 77 towards Corpus Christi, stopping at the Refugio County line for another picture. What can I say about the weather today? Wind, wind, wind. Cloudy, no rain, cool and did I mention the wind. Difficult to stay on the road at times. At Rufugio we turned South on Highway 136 to Bayside and on to Highway 135 and then into Highway 35 and then North on Interstate 37 turning South on Highway 358 (South Padre Island Drive) to our stop for tonight at the Comfort Suites, 3925 S. Padre Island Drive. This is one of the more expensive motels, with high speed internet in all room, both wireless and ethernet. Inside and outside entrances to the room. No extra charge for the half dead cockroach in the bathtub. We had just enough time to unload, get cleaned up and head out again to the other side of town to attend the Corpus Christi HOG meeting. Meeting place was in the 'The BBQ Man' restaurant about 15 miles back North on the other side of town. Met a lot of nice people, including the owner of Corpus Christi Harley Davidson. We'll see him again tomorrow when we visit the store. This seems to be a nice HOG group and we were welcomed and talked to a lot of the members. Some we had already met at other rallies in other years and many of them had arrived at the Louisiana HOG Rally about the same time we did and were lined up behind us for take the picture at the ABC's of Touring banner. These guys do a lot of riding and they have a number of riders who participate in the ABC's of Touring program. Even got an escort by three of the members who were going past our motel on their way home. It was nice to have someone to lead the ride home through unfamiliar territory after dark. Nice ride, nice meeting, nice folks. Finally back in the motel around 9:00PM after a nice, but windy ride of 265 miles, 1,506 miles this trip, 150,398 total miles.
View from the Rear by Cubbear:
Cloudy skies this morning with winds out of the SW at about 10 knots - in the 60's. Left Houston at 9:15AM - rode West and South to Rt 59 towards Victoria, Texas. On the way we rode through a portion of downtown Houston - so many shinny-glass buildings - one being at least 50-60 stories tall. I hate riding alongside one of those building and trying to look up - talk about getting dizzy...
Just South of Wharton we passed a facility that built/made various size water pipes in pretty colors. Think the different colors designate what size the pipe is. Was surprised that we rode over the Colorado River this far South. There were a number of other rivers we crossed too - remember another one on Hwy 59, East of Cordele, that was close to the road; huge and flooded. What a difference since a couple years ago - it was so dry everywhere we rode in Texas. All the creeks/rivers were dried up.
Many areas have wildflowers growing profusely - such as the Texas Blue Bells, etc. The town of El Campo we just rode through looks like they cut the grass around the median and sides of the roads and cut down all the wildflowers. Not sure they can do that at this time of the year in Texas.
We passed many wide open spaces that have recently been plowed and some areas are planted already. The sky is covered with clouds again and the wind has gotten stronger - but thankfully, not too cold.
The Harley Davidson dealer in Victoria was closed (Monday)and when we turned off of Hwy 59 onto Hwy 77 South through Refugio the side of the highway was covered in Black-eyed Susans - saw our second oil well pumping in a field alongside the road.
Rode through a couple of other small towns - Bayside and Portland - and then over this huge bridge into Corpus Christi. Alot of highway and can see the huge oil rigs offshore and other oil tanks/pipes throughout the land. Not sure if this is the area for us - will have to look at some other places in the next couple days.
Mac and I attended the Corpus Christi HOG meeting at the 'BBQ Man' restaurant tonight. Met many friendly people and a bunch of these folks are the ones I walked up to and said Hi to when we were taking our ABC's of Touring picture at the Louisiana State HOG Rally on Friday morning. Three of them even rode with us back to our motel as they were going a little further than we were.
Forgot, one of the guys we met at the Arkansas HOG Rally last year. It's a small world. He tied or came in second for the ABC's of Touring contest in 2003.