Travels and Travails: Beach house in Galveston, TX

June 24, 2015
Acting silly after a swim.

Grandson agrees that the sand is fine! 

Hubby Jeff is a travel planner extraordinaire. He manages to figure out the ultimate itineraries at the lowest cost and highest fun ratios.
A couple of years ago, we discovered Galveston TX when we went down to Houston for a BYU football game. I was impressed!
I’ve seen beautiful beaches. . .(I think Manuel Antonio State Park in Costa Rica wins top spot,) and I grew up near the wide, sun-bleached beaches on the Monterey Bay of CA
Galveston won’t win any beauty contests. It probably won’t enter.
BUT, the beaches of Galveston island have some features that make it worth the drive.
1. The water is a pleasant temperature. No shock but still refreshing.
2. The waves are big enough to body surf, boogie board.
3. I’ve never seen a crowded beach anywhere in TX
4. The sand is extremely fine which makes it perfect for sandcastles and comfortable barefoot walking
5. They’re pretty clean. There had been a major storm through the area right before we went, and there were beach cleaners there first thing in the morning.

A cross wave is about to dump me into the drink. . .again. I had been out beyond the breakers and was riding them back. This is Scott’s sit-on-top kayak. Sit-in kayaks don’t work with surf without skirts because they don’t self-bail like the sea kayaks do.  We tried them and they sank! 

6.They’re free.

Grandsons enjoy the water

The timing of this trip turned out to be sketchy. Tropical Storm “Bill” had just passed through the area and roared right up the freeway we needed to use to drive to Galveston. The last time we were there, we drove home in 7 1/2 hours and this time, with a I-35 flooded and all traffic rerouted 30 miles to the east, to say nothing of the single lane bridge that both north and south traffic had to share over a flooding river, it took us 11 hours. We had just finished with the detour and stopped for gas when the rental agency we’d booked the beach house with, (HomeAway) called us and said that “the house was double booked, . .they’d been trying and trying to get ahold of us for two weeks.” Actually they’d called twice on the same day three weeks earlier in the middle of the workday and didn’t leave a message. 

But the upshot was that they’d refunded our $350 deposit two weeks earlier and we hadn’t noticed and there was no further communication until the day of our planned arrival when she introduced herself by asking if we were in route to TX.
 “Uhhhh, yes.”
So they rebooked us in a nice house next door with the same amenities. 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, sleeping for 12. $365 per night. At first they wanted us to lie about why we were going there. Apparently this house was managed by a different group and the owner of the first house set it up directly with the owner and didn’t want to pay the management fee. But they later called back and managed to get the place unlocked and the beds (mostly) made before we got there.
We paddled around the point of Jamaica Beach (into Galveston Bay) to get to the marsh. It was teeming with wildlife and the fish threatened to jump right into our kayaks. (Son Daniel has lots of sunscreen on his pate)
 
As you can see in the picture, it’s on the saltwater channel, with Galveston Bay a few hundred yards to the west. We enjoyed a nice long swim when we finally got there on Thursday night. The water was clean and many of the homes had swim ladders from their docks.
Son Scott pulls his kayak from the canal with Son-in law Walt’s help while Jeff paddles up to the house we rented in Jamaica Beach, TX.
A cute little sitting room off the kitchen.
 It was cute inside. But I have the feeling that this home had not been used as a vacation rental much yet. There were no towels, dishclothes, or dishsoap. Though there was dishwasher soap, the water seemed to be turned off to the dishwasher because it didn’t work at all. There were no top sheets on any of the beds, and there was no bedding at all on one of the beds. There was no bathsoap,  Fortunately, our daughter-in-law noticed that there was no toilet paper when they arrived before us, so we stopped in town to buy some. 

Grandson McCoey looks into the downstairs laundry room.
Kimberly and Lindsay chat it up on the beach while wearing their youngests.
We’ve rented vacation houses 3 times before this, and it’s a great concept. But these folks need to recognize that if you’re in the hospitality business, you need to be. . .well. . .hospitable. The fact that there were 5 locked closets and the master bathroom was also locked made us feel like unwelcome visitors. (The house is actually a 3 bathroom house, but they eliminate one bathroom.)
 The home we rented on the Outer Banks of North Carolina came with two kayaks, a canoe and a row boat and it was similarly situated on a channel but within easy walking distance to a nice beach. The houses usually have a selection of movies and books and come with ample towels, soaps, appliances, laundry facilities, often with fishing gear and other equipment to support a super fun experience. 
The light house on Bolivar Island. Contrary to popular belief, lighthouses are used for navigation, not to mark rocks. A ship uses a lighthouse, sextant, and charts to find a channel or harbor entrance, or to locate hazards.
We DID have a ball, but it had more to do with coming prepared ourselves than a well-appointed house. When we called the next day and requested towels, he brought over half a dozen ragged towels and some kitchen wash cloths. We had booked it for 12 people. . .I guess we were supposed to share. We made do with the beach towels we had brought.  
 Saturday, we cleaned checked out of the house and took the ferry over to Bolivar Island. It’s a free boatride. This is the second time we’ve done it and we’ve seen dozens of dolphins each time. It’s very fun!

See the dolphin in the front spray from this tanker?
Tourists handfeed the seagulls on the fly.

Grandpa is takin’ it easy! 
Tricia and Walt laugh at muddy Daniel while their nephews appear to be drifting out to sea. Yes, Tricia is in a family way. .. or she had too much ice cream last night.
Scott with his kids and niece  in a sit-in kayak.
 

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