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Our Journey Around the World: Part 12 - South Padre, Texas

South Padre Island is the kind of place that makes you sit back sigh and say “Ahhhhhhh” as you sit back and watch the waves lap up right in front of your balcony. How beautiful this place is.



Getting there was a little more of a challenge. First of all, we got our rental car. Possibly the smallest little blue car we have ever driven. As Carolyn described it, there was simply a hamster running on a wheel under the hood where the engine should be. Getting up a hill was really an exercise in becoming the cheerleader for the little car to get to the top. “You can do it little car, just a little father!  After we get up the hill you will be able to coast down the other side!” Aside from driving a blueberry around, we, once again, utilized the GPS. Once again, It took us in the wrong direction. Once we finally got on track we were on our way to the location for the course.

WOWZERS! The host facility was amazing! Gorgeous location and even the classroom was maybe the best we had ever had.  Angela was beautifully hospitable and her family was amazing!  Completely satisfied after setting up we headed back to our condo for the week. After the GPS once again gave us some “creative” instructions we arrived and headed strait out to the patio to check out the ocean. There is simply no better sound in the world then the ocean crashing right outside your window!

Everyday we went for a walk on the beach. For the first few days this worked out beautifully! Until Carolyn told Kari to “watch out for the crabs, you don’t want to step on one.”  Well up to that point she hadn’t even considered that she COULD step on a crab and was FOUL with Carolyn for putting this in her mind! The rest of the walks weren’t quite as much looking out to the ocean but more at the ground, paranoid of the crab that would surly pop out.

Driving to the host location was a bit of an adventure each day. The first day was dark. Very very dark. The little car purred like a tired platypus as Carolyn tried to get up the first hill. Then the rain began and it poured! Between the rain, the dark, the purring platypus and then the fogging windshield this one was pretty touch and go!

This trip was also the trip of the selfie stick. Oh my goodness did we have fun with that thing… only problem was actually making it work! The rubber kept slipping off the button, so there was either 30 pictures taken or none each time!

We made a few friends on this trip, one being a very persistent seagull. Before we go into this story, you should know that Carolyn only really has two fears. Mascots and birds. Birds and Carolyn don’t really get along. They kind of - scratch that - they totally creep her out. Especially if they get too close. So in a beach location such as South Padre Island, the struggle was real. We had lunch at a nice little place overlooking the ocean and as we sat and ate a seagull landed on the railing nearby. Step by step - he moved closer. And closer. Until we could see his beadie little eyes glowing with anticipation of stealing one of Carolyn’s fries. This did not sit well with her for two reasons; the bird was far too close (shudder) and second, they were her damn fries! So Carolyn used her best authoritative voice to say, “Hey you bird! Back off!” while shaming him with her pointer finger.  But this little guy just kept on coming. Closer and closer and despite Carolyn’s threats and angry hand talking, he just kept creeping in. The only thing left to do in Carolyn’s eyes was to down all of the food as fast as possible to avoid any further interaction with the bird. This lead to immediate heart burn and bloated belly, but to get rid of that bird, “it was totally worth it. Ugh. Freaky.”

While we were in South Padre, we also celebrated Kari’s 50th birthday! Well, we tried anyhow. We thought for this momentum occasion we should probably go out and get our groove on! We tried a couple of places first, but there wasn’t too many people and not really the kind of jam that they were looking for. So a nice young man told us what place would be hopping that night, and off we went with high hopes for a great night. Once we arrived we could hear the music playing inside - this was our jam! Hooray! We have arrived! We have found our fellow music lovers and life shall be grand!  Then we walked in. And our people were there alright. All 6 of them. We tried to get it going, got a few dances in, before deciding that maybe we should just call this one a night and coffee on our balcony looking over the ocean may be a good way to close down the party.

On our way home we had an overnight layover in San Antonio and we are so thankful we did! We went and walked down the Riverwalk which was AMAZING all the way down to the Alamo. If we ever got the chance we would go back as the river walk was our kind of place. It was too bad we were so tired from the week, but it was truly the most amazing layover of all time. Give us a call San Antonio! We will definitely come back that way!

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