Port Aransas, TX - My first trip outside of DFW in 6 months!!

Well, as Mayce and I were preparing to head to the Texas coast last weekend, I realized that I hadn't left the Dallas/Fort Worth area in 6 months - since the 2-day trip down here when I first arrived in Texas. This was alarming to me since I've never stayed in one area for 6 months straight before! But there is soooo much to do here that I didn't even realize that I hadn't left....until I was leaving!

Anyway, last weekend Mayce and I joined 8 of her friends from San Antonio (including her younger brother David) and headed to Port Aransas/Mustang Island just outside of Corpus Christi on the Texas coast. I'm so glad we went that weekend and not this one since we enjoyed the coast just before Hurricane Ike destroyed it. Mayce and I drove down to San Antonio on Thursday afternoon and hung out there with her brother and friends that night. (BTW - we stopped to get gas in Austin on the way down there, so now I can add that to the list of cities that I've been - but I still need to go back to explore and be a tourist).

On Friday morning, we packed up the car and met the others and caravaned to the coast. We bought a bunch of groceries and settled into the 3-bedroom condo. After hanging out for a while, I walked down to the beach with two of the guys on the trip to look for sand dollars. When we were playing in the water (which was like bath water, by the way - wonderful!) we came upon a huge coconut/pod-type thing. We were scared to touch it, but eventually the guys carried it up to the condo and everyone speculated about what was inside of it since it was huge and didn't look like a regular coconut. We were kind of freaked out by it and most of us joked that aliens were going to pop out of it at any second. On Saturday, we decided to crack it open, so the guys beat it against lots of hard objects until it opened. Inside there was a bunch of bark and then a coconut! I think it was rotten because it stunk, but our theory is that it washed up from Hurricane Gustav and it was originally from Cuba or Haiti or something! Here's a picture of our "pod"/coconut!
On Saturday, we played in the ocean and also in the two pools that were at the resort. I didn't get too sunburnt, but I did get somewhat pink in the sun. Our condo was right on the beach, so it was very breezy and we had fabulous sunny weather. In the afternoon, we headed into town and shopped for souvenirs and got sno-cones.

Here are some pics of our view from the condo, the beach and the pools!

Here are pics of the 'boys' and the 'girls' before we went out for the evening on Saturday:

In the evening, we got dressed up and went to The Crazy Cajun, a small restaurant that serves something called The Hungry Cajun - a family style meal where they just dump the food on the table and you just eat it off the white paper. Everyone liked seafood (except one other girl), so they dug in and ate all the nasty crab legs, crawfish, shrimp, potatoes, sausage, etc. Elvia and I are not seafood fans, so we ordered ribs. I was thinking that I would get a plate, but NOPE - our ribs, corn on the cob and potatoes were dumped on the white paper too. It was really fun!! But it was a VERY messy meal - definitely not a "first date" kind of place. :)
We then went to a bar/club called Sharkey's and had drinks and listened to music....a very interesting place!
On Sunday, we packed up and headed back to San Antonio to switch cars and drive back to Dallas. That weekend with the 10 of us was just what I needed - to get out of town, hang out with a group of friendly, fun and wacky people and see several new cities in Texas!! They go every year on the weekend after Labor Day (much better rates after the holiday) - I can't for next year!