Total Miles Traveled 1497
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We arrived at Port Aransas on December 30th, just in time to bring in the New Year. Roberts Point Park is a small section of land that lays between the shipping channel to the Gulf and the municipal marina. The city provided an outstanding fireworks display from the park to ring in the New Year. Our slip is located almost directly behind the event so we had a front row seat to the celebration.
We have met some really nice people here. When we were at Corpus Christi, we heard rumors of Port A being a high theft area with some shady people. Not the case at all, there are two liveaboards on our pier and they assure us there is not a problem at the marina. We have been all over town and haven’t seen the first homeless person, or anyone looking “shady”. Now Corpus Christi was a different story, several homeless walking around and some of them were walking alone having a major argument with themselves?
During our first few weeks here, we have been catching up on a few maintenance items and a few upgrades. Since most of this area, and Corpus Christi was impacted by hurricane Harvey in 2017, it has been a slow process getting everything back to normal. They are currently building a new marina office and facilities here at the marina. One issue we have had is the Corpus Christi marina, nor the Port Aransas marina haven’t replaced their Wi-Fi service.
This is quite a big deal for us as we rely on a good internet connection to stream movies, video chat with family, and keep our navigation software up to date. We decided to install the new Starlink satellite internet service on our boat to have internet access at a marina, or if anchored out in a remote area without cell service. If you’re not familiar with Starlink, it is a satellite internet service operated by SpaceX, an Elon Musk project. It provides Internet access using thousands of small satellites that stay in low earth orbit. By using a phased array technology, they have developed a small computer-controlled antenna.
We are using the RV model for our boat. It is designed to stow away while traveling, then placed outside at the location when stopped with a clear view of the sky, turn it on, and it searches for a nearby satellite link. Since we travel at 8 mph, we have it permanently attached to the boat and place it in stow mode while traveling, then power up after we stop. Everything is controlled by an app on my phone and a Starlink router. It has been super-fast at this location.
We have been riding our scooters all over town and checked out several of the local restaurants. We usually walk around the park everyday and check out the people fishing along the ship channel. We have purchased our Texas fishing license, but haven’t been too serious about it yet. I would rather fish from the dinghy, anchored, or trolling from our boat. Moni has caught a few nice ones at our slip though.
We have the usual pirate ship and tour boats going by, and a lot of deep-sea fishing charters. We usually sit up in the flybridge of an evening and watch the ships go by on one side, and the charters and tour boats pass on the other side. Pretty good entertainment during docktails.
One ship I found very interesting is the trailing suction hopper dredge. The ships that pass through here are enormous, and when loaded sit low in the water so the channel must be deep to accommodate their size.
We have seen a lot of dredges in our travels but nothing
like this one. The dredges we are
familiar with have at least one tow with it and usually are dredging the bottom
and placing the product in a barge to be hauled away or pumping it through
piping stretched across the water to the shore.
The trailing suction hopper dredge lowers suction pipes to the bottom
and sucks the sand and silt up and into storage tanks on the ship. When full, the ship travels out to sea and
either deposits the product in deep water or pumps it ashore. If you’re interested how it works, here is a
short video.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MhysyOJHY8A
Another interesting feature here is the Port Aransas Ferry System. Mustang Island is 18 miles long and the only way to get here is by boat, the ferry system on the north end, and a bridge on the south end. The Port Aransas ferry route runs between two and six ferries a day, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year, weather permitting, and its FREE!
We have been by the beach, but the weather hasn’t given
us a good beach day yet, especially if the wind is blowing from the Gulf. The beach has a very wide shoreline of packed
sand that you can drive, park, or stay overnight in a van or RV. I try to avoid taking the scooters on the
beach to avoid getting salt and sand in the electric motor drive wheel and
bearings.
This month we plan to visit a couple of museums, the beach, the jetty going out to the Gulf, and a cruise to South Padre Island, our southern most destination of our trip to Texas. I’m hoping we can watch the SpaceX Starship first launch and orbital space flight from Boca Chica Texas while anchored at South Padre Island. It is scheduled for liftoff February 27th. SpaceX Starship is the tallest (394 feet and 30 feet wide) most powerful launch vehicle ever built, and the first capable of total reusability. This would be an awesome highlight of our trip to Texas!
