YOLO heading east inTexas Feb 2022

 We headed east towards Austin, TX to visit more sailing friends.  This time, Jim and Susan hosted us for a couple of nights while we swapped tales and had a look around their quaint new hometown of Wimberley.  A very comfortable home with nature right out their back door and all around.  This cute chameleon sculpture was in the park area nearby.

This interesting rock style of building is called 'giraffe',  It's not hard to understand why.

Jim and Susie after our breakfast out.  We wandered the shops that were open and I found a little collapsible colander.  We'd had one on the boat years ago that was really just a macaroni trampoline; it bounced the pasta all over the galley, but this one seemed like it might work better for the van.

This giant painted cowboy boot decorated the outside of a shop.

This rattlesnake skeleton wound its way through the grill of this truck from Texas.  It was parked outside of a neat little rock shop where the owner had just returned from the big rock and mineral show in Quartzsite, AZ.  She was still unloading boxes of new treasures that we, unfortunately, didn't have time to stick around and discover once they were unpacked.

We visited the local 'Swimming Hole' in a park.  This tree looked to be a great spot to jump into the water from the ring hanging on it.  The water was a lovely teal color, too.

Our stay coincided with the near "snowpoclypse", a freezing rain and snow event that threatened to shut down the entire Austin area for the second time in two years.  Folks were preparing for lengthy power outages, checking batteries and stocking up on food and fuel.  YOLO was coated in a quarter inch of ice.  I nearly broke the door handle trying to get the door opened.  

Although the authorities cautioned residents to stay home and off the treacherous, icy roads, Jason decided that was the time for us to leave.  We're standing in the driveway waiting for the ice to melt off the windshield enough so we could see (we didn't bring a scraper as we thought we were heading to warmer climes).

As we headed southeast, the air warmed, the ice began to melt and fly off the van in sheets.  There was little traffic out on any of the roads as the sane folks of Austin stayed put for the day.  Once we were ice-free, we began to enjoy the scenery and realized we were in an area that sold the pecan pies that Jim and Susie had talked about. A whole pie was more than we wanted or needed, but these pecan bars were just perfect to enjoy the rich, decadent taste.

Eventually, we reached the beach on the Gulf of Mexico and found a little town called Indianola where we could park for free on the beach.  It was a cute location where you could stay for up to 14 days for free.   We needed to hunker down for a strong wind event and parked facing into the wind so we didn't rock all night.  Here is Jason checking out our spot to park.

After the rough waves, I found some interesting things washed ashore.  Some beach glass and pretty shells.

More shells from the beach.  A cool old glass stopper from a perfume bottle, a piece of broken china, some purple glass and a piece of rounded old dark green glass from something with an unusual shape turned up in my beachcombing search.

Jason relaxing out of the wind in Indianola.

More treasures from the sand.

Our view from the van.  The hot pink pavilions are iconic for this beach park. 

Onward we drove, once the wind died down, to Matagorda Beach park.  A very long boardwalk crossed over the dunes to the water.  This shot is from only half way out.  I spotted some dolphins or small black whales out beyond the end of the boardwalk.

This is the view looking back towards the parking lot where we stayed.  It was a long walk out and back.

We met another vanlifer who had wanted to go park on the beach the night before.  We'd warned him about getting stuck in soft sand, but he did it anyway and got stuck.  The next morning, he was once again parked in the lot near us.  Jason wanted to take his dog, Lula for a walk.  The edge of the marshy inlet is 'paved' with these huge slabs of pink granite.  They all have the channels from a drill, so we wondered if these were the offcast blocks from some quarry providing granite for building.  We ended up seeing these granite slabs at several places along the beaches in different states, being used to stabilize the sand and keep it from eroding. 

The bridge to our next location took us over the ICW (IntraCoastal Waterway).  Barges pushed by tugs were the prominent traffic on the ICW.

A colorful line of cabins along the road.  Reminds me of that song, "Little Boxes".

A catfish head on the beach.  Guess the rest was dinner for someone or someting?

And this litte white stingray was upside down in the surf, too.

This is actually an egg case for a whelk.

This ultralight pilot came in close and fast for several passes over the island parking lot where we parked.  This area is still unrebuilt after recent hurricane damage.  That pier on the left goes nowhere and there is no way to get to it.

We parked right alongside the ICW for the night.  

That useless bit of pier at sunset near Surfside Beach.

Could this be our next honeymoon cottage?

Another beach parking opportunity along the gulf.  So far, we're liking this free beach parking, though we do have to be careful to stick to the hardpacked sand or shells so we don't get stuck.

This cute little shell had me stumped.  Perhaps a baby crab of some sort?  

Also some lumps of coal and a whelk shell on the beach.

To continue east, we took the free ferry from Galveston across the water to Port Bolivar.  It's free going west to east, but only a couple of bucks to go the other way.  This tanker turned around right in front of our ferry.

Looking down at YOLO from the 2nd level on the car ferry.  The rooftop is still the original white.

Jason walking along the beach looking at the shells.  We didn't like the looks of this sand for our heavy van, so parked across the street.  Mosquito city, unfortunately!

These huge cranes impressed Jason with their size and lifting capabilities at this refinery we passed.

I've seen these squiggly sand extrusions all over the world, but they never cease to amaze me.  They are so fragile, too.  

Found this toy car in the sand.  You might recognize it from the Pixar movie Cars.

We stopped to look at this old drilling platform.  Then we noticed the guy in the center of the photo with a flame torch, cutting the metal up to scrap/recycle it.

The next waterway required us to catch another free ferry or drive a hundred miles to go up and around the water.  The regular ferry was still being repaired from hurricane damage so this temporary ferry was set up to handle vehicles.  This statue of an alligator was at the ferry loading location.  YOLO is in the background waiting in line.

YOLO got stuck on the ferry loading ramp.  A bolt under the rear step got caught in their gridwork.  The long overhang caught on the ramp and we stalled the loading process until someone found a jack and some wood to make the angle for loading a bit better.

Jason adjusting the boards so the nails sticking out don't puncture the tires.  The ferry loading lady thought she had a truck jack in her truck, but it was missing, so one of the other ferry guys jacked the van up and we drove it over the wooden ramp and got it on the ferry.  Getting off was not a problem.  The ferry folks were very nice about it and were very appreciative of the way we handled the situation.  It's all part of the adventure, right?

We got off the ferry and headed east to try to find Rutherford Beach, a place another vanlifer had told us about in Louisiana.