One Week Along The Coast

So I’ve been on the road for about two weeks and along the Gulf coast now for a bit over a week. I’ve seen a lot. I can only stop to give a quick update here right now because there is much to do out in the world with my camera. Something I saw yesterday has caused me to pause to share it with you though. I’ll get to that in a minute.

I began my tour of the coast at the U.S.-Mexican border where the Rio Grande enters the Gulf of Mexico. I was met by a rainbow and then the next morning witnessed some baby Kemp’s Ridley sea turtles being launched into life and into the Gulf. I moved on to Padre Island for more baby Kemp’s Ridley releases and then on to the Bolivar Peninsula and Galveston Bay.

I’ve connected with a wonderful network of people called Water Keepers – check out their work at http://www.waterkeeper.org/ I’ve seen lots of seemingly happy Gulf creatures of all sorts – from baby turtles, to crabs, to seaweed, to humans, to fish, to sharks and brown pelicans. I’ve seen lots of industry and agriculture and these places called wildlife refuges where wildlife is “protected”. That seems a bit of a false advertisement though – because they really are places that seem to just grow birds for hunters to kill each fall when the refuges have their only open time. – not that I am criticizing hunting for food mind you – all creatures do that. It just seems a bit more correct to call these places hunter refuges instead of wildlife refuges, don’t you think?

Yesterday I went to a place called Sea Rim State Park and was met by sand, 3 seagulls, quietly lapping water, some plastic bottles and wrappers and an absence of  any sort of bustle and life that I’ve seen on any other beach I’ve ever been on. About 10 miles up the coast – a cement plant, a shipyard that works on oil platforms, a very large refinery.

Now I’m off toward Louisiana.

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