Our Trips -Page 5 (Padre Island NS and Pedernales Falls SP)-

The Kings' Camp Site

Padre Island National Seashore

Corpus Christi, Texas

Our visit to Padre Island National Seashore was a quickie, only a one night stay. We had been to this campground before (Malaquite Beach) which is the park's only semi-primitive campground . The other camping areas are primitive and are mainly right on the beach. The one time we had visited before was the one and only time we had attempted to tent-camp. Pretty much a comedy of errors it was, and we ended up packing it in at about 2 a.m. that trip and heading to a hotel. (We weren't too upset when we broke the tent pole while trying to dismantle it in the dark.We weren't about to use it again, anyway!)

The campground is pretty much a parking lot, but just over the dunes sits the beach and the Gulf of Mexico. The campground is clean and well-patrolled and hardly ever crowded. There are 6 showers (including two which are handicapped accessible.) There are also fairly clean men and women's restrooms. Most people were camping in tents while we were there, but there were some RVs and we were the only pop up. Another pop up was leaving as we came in. This beach is WINDY. All night long the wind blew at 25-30 MPH. The pop up did fine, but man did it make a lot of noise!There are cement picnic tables at each site, but there are no hook-ups and no fire rings. (The park allows small contained fires near the campsites, but not on the beach.) It was our first trip in the pop up to dry camp and we did just fine, I'm proud to say. The access to showers and bathrooms did help though, so maybe we cheated...just a little.;)

Despite the wind , the weather was great and we had a MUCH better time at Padre Island this time than we did the last. We even met a very interesting and nice family of four who were travelling in a Class A motor home. The parents had quit their successful jobs (He a sales manager for Toshiba and she a teacher) , sold their home and were living their dream...to homeschool (or is it RV school?) the kids and travel around the country. Their boys were very polite, outgoing and intelligent and seemed to be happy to find a new friend in Justin. Unfortunately, we did not get their last names and did not have a chance to say "goodbye" before we left, but it's always cool to meet interesting people like that. The beach had quite a bit of seaweed washed up on it, but the waves were great--excellent for boogie-boarding and body-surfing. The beach also has many shaded picnic tables next to the dunes. We're already planning our next trip to Padre Island...only next time we'll find a way to stay longer.

our campsite-- duneside

Bathrooms and showers at Padre Island NS

The pinic tables on the beach

The kids building a sandcastle on the beach

Our daughter, son and our daughter's friend having fun

Sunset over the dunes at Padre Island

Pedernales Falls SP

Our trip to Pedernales Falls with the Subterranean Underground Clandestine Camping Club (or SUCCC :)) was a lot of fun...not necessarily because of the weather or even the park itself but mainly because the group of people we had the fortunate opportunity to camp with this trip. As a result, the pictures are few and exploring the park was secondary, but we'll always think of our Pedernales Fall trip fondly because of the great people we camped with. Pedernales Falls is situated in the hill country just 8 miles east of Johnson City, Texas. (birthplace of the 36th president of the United States, Lyndon B. Johnson) The park is situated on the Pedernales River and has areas for swimming, hiking, kayaking and fishing.

Of course, true to our camping tradition, the evening we arrived was cloudy and muggy and it thunderstormed that night. At least we had gotten our pop up set up long before the rain arrived so we were warm and dry in our camper. The next day was mostly cloudy, but it only showered later in the day so we had a few hours to go down to the river and find some hiking trails. The trip down to the river is at quite a downhill slope and is very steep coming back up, even to the parking area near to the river. There's also a trail that leads to the river from the campground, but (as far as we could tell) this trail did not lead to the swimming area. The river itself is VERY rocky. It's strongly recommended that swimmers and waders wear water shoes or sneakers to avoid killing your feet. There are a series of small waterfalls at various points in the river and there are some shallower areas right near the shore but swimmers should be aware of drop offs right past the shore. Also, there were loads of warnings regarding the flooding potential of this river during heavy rains. (On the park's website there's a pretty wild picture of a before and 5 minutes after when a flash flood hits the river.)

Most of the sites at the park are fairly private. The only complaint we had with our site (#42) was that it was a bit of a hike behind the camping pad and some trees to reach our picnic table and fire ring. Of course our son thought this was really cool and declared that he'd "always wanted a site like this." The nice thing about this park is that there's firewood and bagged ice for sale just at the entrance to the campsites, in front of the park hosts' site. There are some really nice hiking trails and if it weren't for the off and on rain that continued through the weekend, we probably could have explored a lot more. Thank goodness having good friends around helped make up for the semi-lousy weather and we ended up having a great time anyway. (Restaurant recommendation: The Hill Country Cupboard in Johnson City. Good food and very reasonably priced--$27 for 4 of us to eat )