Down On The Beach

Sunday afternoon we found ourselves sitting around the front yard, staring off into space in a stupor of boredom. It was well after 3 in the afternoon, and none of us felt like doing much of anything. My oldest son suggested going to the beach, so we all piled into the car and headed for the shore. The trip was far from boring, as the landscape between home and the beach still bears the scars of Hurricane Ike, which devastated the area in September of last year. We marveled at flood debris 8 - 9 feet up in trees as we got nearer to our destination.
The highway we traveled on runs perpendicular to the shore until you get right to the beach; then you make a 90-degree turn to follow the peninsula down to the ferry to go to Galveston Island. About 2 miles before our turn, we crested a small hill and were staring straight at the Gulf of Mexico. In previous years, there had been a "barrier" constructed between the actual beach and the highway. It was tall enough to completely impede your view of the beach, and consisted of sand and various native flora. Imagine our surprise to see that the barrier was nowhere to be seen, having been leveled by the hurricane.


The shore itself has become so badly eroded that huge areas of clay are now visible where the sand once was.

It was a huge eye-opener to go down there, and it makes me wonder what the future will hold for the peninsula.