Take what the weather gives you

I didn't get in a lot of mileage today but managed to make it to my destination anyway, despite toying with the idea of changing my agenda this morning. I made an early (as in time of day) exit from my route when I pulled into a Hilton Garden Inn Express at 2 p.m. and they were still cleaning rooms prior to check-in time.

I was greeted with the news that Corpus Christi is under a city-wide drinking water boil alert. When I asked if they knew why the order was in effect I was told that, due to the extraordinary amount of rain they've had the chlorine level in the city water supply had dropped. Yet I had made it to town, once again, dry. If you could see the weather outside right now you would know what a miracle that is.

A video would have been much more effective, showing the gale-force gusts of winds that were bending the plant in the foreground 90 degrees from upright.

I started once again, early in the morning with the continental breakfast. I had rested well the evening before with a dip in the pool (a first for this trip and the first time in memory that I swam in chlorinated water instead of white-water). It was so refreshing that I returned just before dark to sit quietly on a lounge chair and work on my blog while listening to my music on Pandora. As I said, it was a very enjoyable evening. 

After breakfast I packed quickly and was on the road by 7:10, or so. My plan was to ride to the International border, perhaps take a picture, then ride over to the one point in Southern Texas that all who knew the area recommended, Śouth Padre Island, which sits on an isthmus in the Atlantic Ocean... er, the Gulf Of Mexico.

The trip to Brownsville took very little time... I guess I was ahead of rush hour, even with a fuel stop and time spent with the Girls, who decided to take another day off once they got me lost on the campus of UTBrownsville.

I found the border, behind the seemingly ever-present fence, on a raised walkway, but could not find a crossing inspection station. I tried to flag a old-timer down in Lincoln Park but as I debiked he found a second gear with his walker and never looked back.

I moved a little further down through the parking lot in the park and found a park worker. I asked him, "do you speak English?" and his answer was "no". Because he didn't start his sentence with a capital letter, I could tell it was a Mexican "no".

So I went just down the road and found myself on the campus of UTB, where I found a maintenance office with workers showing up for work. I asked a lady at her car, "Yo Harlan Englese?" in my best Mexican but because I only used the one question mark she said "no", again in Mexican. I pointed toward the office and asked "insido?". She answered "si", indicating it was okay for me to go in and "see". This Mexican isn't so hard.

They directed me over one block to where I would find the gate in the International Walkway that people used to travel between the two countries. I went to the end of the block and the Girls directed me to turn left right where I had been told to by the maintenance Department. I thought I was on to something, but it was the last time I heard from the Girls all day.

This gate is probably used for the Border Patrol Classes taught at UTB

The fence was there, the gate was there, but that was it. So I went back and got on the highway, turned onto the southbound lane, went one block and the Freeway ended at the Border Crossing!

An actual International Border Crossing. I was a little disappointed that, with all the Federal funds spent to operate the facility, they couldn't remain focused any better than this!

After a quick picture, I did a u-turn (not normally a good thing to do on a Freeway) and went back a couple exits, headed east until I was sure that:

A: the Girls weren't going to rescue me

B: I was good and lost

C: Google Maps wasn't going to rescue me because there was no signal what-so-ever

So while I'm sitting on the side of a very busy street looking at my phone/GPS, a very nice young man stopped across the road from me and asked if I was lost. I told him yes, I was trying to get on the highway toward Port Isabel. He proceeded to tell me, in great detail all of the different options I had available to me. He talked on and on and I didn't have the heart to interrupt him and tell him that, due to the distance between us, the engine noise of both our vehicles and the sound of no less than 25 cars that continually interrupted both line of sight and sound, I was catching about 10% of what he was chattering on and on about.

He finally went on his way, I backtracked in the direction he had pointed and found signs that got me back on the right highway; the exact same highway I had taken down to where I came from (huh? I'm lost again)!

So at 10 a.m. I rode northbound past my original starting point from 3 hours before! It took me only a short time to reach Port Isabel and the causeway to South Padres Island.

I stopped at a gas station just on the other end of the causeway and asked for recommended things to see and do. It was recommended that I see the Sea Turtle Rescue Center and take a Dolphin Watch boat ride.

By this time it was 11 a.m. The next Dolphin Watch was at 1:30 and it was two hours long. That would put me into Corpus Christi late and in the high heat of the day. I had nowhere to put my helmet and jacket during the trip so I hatched a plan B. I would find a motel for the night, put my gear in the room, go to the Turtle place, see the beach and return for the Dolphin Watch. So I rode down the road and passed a Motel 6 advertising rooms from $39.95/ night! All was looking good until I got far enough down the road to find beach access. The weather was not looking good and there was a Red Flag alert posted. I also, lucky me, found movie star Halli Berry coming out of the water in a bikini. She agreed to recreate the scene from her James Bond movie for my camera (what a regular person!)

Most starlets would have ignored my grovelling

I went just a little further down the road and found it to be nothing more than a strip of blacktop between the beach on the bay to the left and the beach on the Gulf to the right.

The road narrows as the wind picks up

I did a U-turn and went back to check out the Sea Turtle Rescue Mission where they feed homeless Sea Turtles, and found two signs that pretty much tell the story:

A nice gentleman who rode the perimeter of Mexico on a motorcycle in the '70s stopped to talk. He said he won't even go into Mexico now. The drug cartels see Gringos as a source of kidnapping revenue and the people are animals. He said last weekend they had a lady pass out in the heat while standing in line. While the EMTs worked on her the people were stepping over her to get their tickets!

So I retreated to the Motel 6 to check on a room where I could leave my gear while on the Dolphin Watch. They would not let me check in until 3p.m., so I re-evaluated Plan B.

No Turtle Tour, red flag warning for boating, no motel room to put my gear in, weather getting worse... I decided that there will be several other opportunities for Dolphin watching and I would return to Plan A. As I started back across the causeway, still wondering if I was making the right decision, I saw a small patch of blue sky in the otherwise threatening firmament, and it was directly over the causeway! Asked and answered, I rest my case!

I reset my sites on Corpus Christibut the heat and humidity were building quickly. It was still early but the acceptable travel hours were dwindling, and so was I.

I misjudged the number of exits before striking north on highway 77 and found myself hungry, tired and low on fuel, all while fighting the heat. Town after town turned out to be nothing more than a mail drop for ranchers in the area. My gauge was reading empty, my range indicator was showing less than 60 miles, when I came to a Border Patrol Check point in the middle of nowhere. I made it passed the drug dogs to the agent who usually waves me through. I stopped, flipped up my helmet and asked, just as he asked if I was a U.S. Citizen, "how far to the next gas station?". 

"About 20 miles, you going to make it?" He asked.

"Yes and I hope so".

He had a puzzled look on his face so I explained, "Yes, I'm a citizen, and I hope I can make it another 20 miles".

I did make it, got a quick sandwich and, as the next patch of blue opened up just to the north of the gas station, I drove out through the big puddle from the last storm and headed north again. I soon found myself coming into a confusing maze of exits and, based on a couple of drops of rain that hit my windscreen, decided to grab the first motel I came to. I drove blindly, with the Girls still on strike and ended up here, at the Garden Inn Express, before check-in time. The timing was perfect. A room had just been set up on the first floor and they let me move my gear in just ahead of the wind and sprinkles. If I had still been on the rode when the wind had started blowing it may have blown me off the highway.

The clerk up front said the weather has been horrible, with rain storms daily all month. When I told him I had just ridden 4200 miles and not yet been rained on he chucked, and said, "Welcome to Corpus Christi".