SPI Part 1

Our long, long drive to South Padre Island was kicked off with a visit to the Czech Stop Bakery- the best Kolaches EVER.  You can see that Birdy is holding on in the picture. Kolaches are a sweet roll dough that is baked with fruit and sometimes frosting in the middle. Yum!  We got a dozen (in addition to their excellent sausage rolls) and most of them were eaten by the time our drive was done.

We made pretty good time to the hotel, considering that TX is a ginormous state.  We had a balcony and you could see the ocean from it!  We had time to eat a little dinner, take a swim and even walk on the beach a bit.  

The next morning was sunny but kind of chilly and very, very windy. We had wind gusts up to 30 mph that day and it was the "good" day on our visit.  The weather was *supposed* to improve later in the day so we decided to spend the morning exploring the bird sanctuary and nature center.  They have a really cool lookout tower 3 stories up, but the outside part was closed because of the wind.

The center had lots and lots of boardwalks through the salt marsh so you could walk around and see all the birds that live there.  We got a cool "scavenger hunt" sheet with some of the more common ones and we had fun checking off each one we saw.  One of my favorites was the little guy above.  He had a looonnngg beak that he stuck into the mud and then he somehow caught something on the very end and ate it! I still have no idea how the food got from the end of his beak to his mouth!

At the end of one of the boardwalks, there was a sheltered butterfly garden. It was really neat (and a good break from the wind!

After the center, the weather did not improve and so we went back to the mainland to explore what there was to do there.  We visited a really neat, small aquarium that had a lot of fish and critters that live in the bay.  We saw octopus, seahorses, hermit crabs and lots of other things. 

Then it was back to the hotel.  After dinner we decided to brave the beach- red flag and giant surf and all!

Bear did NOT like the waves or the wind.  The girls had a lot of fun exploring the beach and gathering shells until it was too dark.  EJ found a coconut!

After the beach, we piled on one of the beds to watch Shrek on the laptop.  Watching a movie with 5 people on a queen bed is an experience I won't forget soon!