Captain’s Log: RV Wanderlust 06-03-2014

• Date: 06-03-2014

• Current City: Galveston, TX
• Current Location: Bayou Shores RV Park
• Site Number: D-18
• Wi-fi Signal: Verizon - Medium / AT&T - Medium / Campground Wi-fi - Slow
• Mission: Enjoy the beach, work for clients, explore.

• Compliment: 2 Officers, 1 Crew, 0 Guests
• Captain: Eric Highland
• Navigator: Brittany Highland
• 1st Mate: Trogdor the Burninator
• Guests: None

• Weather: Scattered Clouds / 84°
• Precipitation: 30%
• Humidity: 76%
• Wind: 15 mph

• Fuel: 75 Gallons of Diesel - 3/4 of a tank
• Odometer: 101,506
• Generator Hours: 4611.8

• Estimated Date of Departure: Saturday, June 7th
• Next Destination: Aviation Arbor RV Park in New Orleans, LA

Special Orders: None.

Captain’s Remarks

15:04 - You may think we’ve been MIA, but the truth is we’ve been so busy these past few days that I’ve literally had to force myself to stop and write. We arrived in Galveston on Saturday the 31st. Met with Kay at the front desk of Bayou Shores RV Resort and got checked in.

Kay was a sweetheart, and happy to recommend some local spots around town. We knew we’d take her up on those spots later, but right now we were focused on one thing… getting to the World’s Largest Amateur Sandcastle Competition.

15:07 - Immediately after parking Meriwether, we headed out in Smaug to East Beach. The only thing was that when we got to a certain point, traffic just came to a standstill. Lucky for us we had our bikes on the back of Smaug so we found some street parking and hopped on our bikes to make it out to the sandcastle competition.

What we didn’t realize is that it was still a good 2 miles away, and you had to ride on a sidewalk with a 6 foot drop off, then through puddles of mud and sand and New York style in between cars to get to the spot.

We finally made it though and we were rewarded with amazing sights like this…

We walked up and down the beach looking at all the entries, there were 62 of them in total. I’ll post some of the best ones here for you to look at.

About half-way through we got a couple of sno-cones. Grape and Strawberry mixed if you must know. They really hit the spot. Then we found a couple of beach chairs with an umbrella and just sat down for awhile to take it all in.

Finally we decided to make the trek back to Smaug. We (and our bikes) were covered in mud and sand.

However we didn’t let that deter us from heading out to dinner at this fun place called The Spot. We had a table on the second floor over looking the Gulf. The view was awesome and The Spot was a ton of fun, we knew we’d be back.

15:17 - On Sunday we washed the bikes then we went to an area of town called The Strand. It is the historic district of Galveston and very close to the cruise ship terminals. We loved this area, and more importantly, while there finally decided on the “theme” for our interior decor of Meriwether. We’re going to have a nautical theme.

We purchased two pillows as our first purchase toward this theme and saw a bunch of other things that we think would make Meriwether come alive with both character and style.

Brittany kept me on a tight leash though and we walked out of the store with just the pillows.. for now..

We then did a little clothes shopping. Brittany got a new elegant beach outfit, complete with a floppy beach hat and I walked away in a new pair of flip flops.

We also found a military surplus store that was huge! We spent a good hour in there browsing around and enjoying the history of the items found therein. It was Brittany’s first time in a shop like that and she really liked it.

After our time at The Strand, we decided to stop at a place for lunch that several folks had recommended called Shrimp and Stuff. We had a nice lunch on their outdoor patio. The restaurant itself is a casual place with mostly fried food.

It was a nice outing but not my number one pick to recommend, the ambiance was a bit lacking. Having said that, their shrimp po-boy was pretty outstanding.

Following lunch, we jetted home to get our swimsuits and drop off our loot and then we headed to the beach.

The seaweed was pretty crazy so we didn’t literally go swimming, but we did wade out into the warm waters of the gulf and spent time lying on our blanket soaking in the rays and listening to the Beach Boys on our bluetooth speaker.

Not done yet, we decided to head back to The Spot for chips and drinks and a little live music. Brittany really enjoyed her margaritas (yes that was plural) and I enjoyed my water. I’ve been doing really well with my diet and exercise and I’ve lost 5lbs so far.

We finally came home and called it a night.

15:31 - Yesterday (Monday) I decided to tackle our turning light issue. For those of you faithful readers you’ll remember that all of a sudden all of our turning signals stopped working. I checked the fuse and it was good. Stumped, I polled my friends on Facebook only to find that the issue was a flasher, commonly called a relay.

My friend Lee C., walked me through the troubleshooting and together we were able to find the culprit. It was this little guy…

If you are reading this, thanks Lee!

So $15 later, our turning signals were operational again. I went out to buy a relay to replace the broken one and stopped at the Coast Guard base here in Galveston to do a little shopping. I came home with two bags full of loot including a unit ball cap from the very first ship I was ever stationed on, the USCGC Dauntless.

After work we decided to take the ferry out to Port Bolivar. The ferry is FREE and it was a nice little ride.

From there it was a straight 12 miles or so to Crystal City and dinner at the Stingaree Down Under. I highly recommend this place! The food was excellent, the beach bar atmosphere is exactly what you’d hope for and they have a lovely deck right on the water where you can just hang out. And that we did.

15:42 - And that brings us to today. We’ve been working all day, we’ve started working with a new client and we’re full throttle and full capacity. But things are getting done and getting done well. Not sure where our adventures will take us tonight, but wherever it is, I’m sure it will be a blast.. after all.. I have my best friend with me.

Remarks - Being in Galveston, away from Austin has given Brittany and I a chance to breathe. Though it may seem as though we’re constantly busy, and we are, we actually have more time for each other when we’re out on our adventures. Last night, sitting on the deck at Stingaree we had a long conversation about all kinds of things. The kind of conversation that doesn’t revolve around work, but around our philosophy on life. At one point in time I was told, “Your opinion sucks.” Haha. I love my Brittany. We live uncensored, we love each other fully and without reservation and we respect each other enough to be candid about all things. ~ E

Navigator’s Addendum