Texas Vacation - Day Six - Beware Galveston Weather

Okay this post is a little different than the others. We are actually going to finish off with the evening of Day 5 (Tuesday April 9) and then roll right into Day 6 (Wednesday April 10.)

You'll see why. 

Tuesday had been great! We'd spent the day at the Houston Zoo and had made so many great memories. Now it was time to continue to our next destination. Galveston!

Our drive to Galveston was kind of eventful. We were leaving Houston during rush hour so traffic was crazy. Then we ended up driving on a toll road by accident. (I joked we needed to make a Road Trip Bingo Card and put "accidently driving on a toll road" as one of the spaces.) I was kind of curious how the toll road would work since we were in a rental car. Basically they took a picture of our license plate and later Enterprise sent us a bill for the toll with a $5 service fee added on.

Anyway, it was probably worth it because I think it got us out of the city faster than if we'd been on the other roads. 

As we got closer to Galveston I started thinking of things we needed. My weather app had been predicting rain since Monday, and so far we'd been lucky and avoided it. But the sky was full of clouds and I was thinking that we might not dodge rain this time. We had our canopy, but that wouldn't do anything for blowing rain. I could just picture Brandon trying to cook under the canopy, but getting wet from rain blowing sideways. So I wanted to stop at Walmart and buy a tarp for the sides. Also we were having pancakes for breakfast, but we needed eggs and syrup to go with those. 

So when we got to Galveston we first stopped at the Walmart. I took Derrick and Veronica with me and we ran inside to buy the things on the list. Then we came back to the car. For some reason our car was in a line of other black vans. It was kind of funny. I was like, "Where's the one with Maryland Plates."  Yep, even though we were from Idaho we'd been driving a van with Maryland license plates. Every time we did something wrong on the road we'd joke, "Sorry, we don't know any better, we are from Maryland."

We left Walmart and kept driving. The Walmart was so close to the seawall, but we couldn't see the water until we went over a rise in the road. Derrick had been eagerly watching the ocean get closer and closer on the GPS during our whole drive to Texas. He'd been so disappointed when we'd stopped at Buescher state park on Saturday. He'd been like, "The ocean is so close! Why are we stopping here?" 

So he was especially eager to finally see the water. We went over that rise and it was  . . . not exactly what we were expecting. 

I think we were all picturing calm, beautiful, blue water. Instead we saw an angry grey tempest. There were large waves slamming against the shore. The sky was grey, the water was grey, the beach was grey. It was scary. 

We were camping at Galveston Island State Park and as we drove closer I was starting to second guess that decision. 

Back when I planned this trip I knew that if we were driving all the way to Texas we HAD to spend a day or two at the beach. And Galveston was the closest beach. We'd been here a couple times for day trips. We'd also camped here when we did a whole road trip along the Texas Coastline. 

At first I'd thought that we'd maybe stay in an Air BNB or a Vrbo. But when I looked those up they seemed over priced and too far from the water. Since we already had to buy a Texas Park Pass for Buescher State Park and we'd already have all our camping stuff I decided that we should camp at Galveston State Park. 

A little voice at the back of my head said, "Um, is that a good idea? You got rained on last time you camped at Galveston Island. You had to go to a laundry mat to dry your clothes."

And I said, "What are the odds that will happen again? We should go back and have a good visit this time. Besides its $12 a night. You can't beat that."

And that little voice shut up for 5 months. But as we got closer to the State Park that little voice was starting to bring up some concerns. 

When we got to the campsite that little voice was getting pretty loud. 

There were so many things wrong with the campsite. 

1. It looked wrong. I'd tried to get the same site that we'd had in 2014. But I was certain that there used to be shelters at each site. Those shelters were gone. (Had there been a hurricane that knocked them down?)

2. The bathrooms were far away. I'm certain there had been bathrooms near this site in 2014, but there were no bathrooms here. I'd known that when I booked the site, but I'd assumed that the walk to the other bathrooms wasn't that far. But in real life it was sooooo much farther. And there didn't seem to be a trail. 

3. The vegetation was burned! One of the reasons I wanted to camp here was that it was so close to the beach. There were dunes between our campsite and the beach and when we were here in 2014 they'd had pretty yellow flowers on them. This time there had been a fire that had burned all the plants on the dunes between our campsite and the beach. So we didn't even have a pretty view from our campsite. 

All this was stuff we could live with though.  We didn't need a shelter because we had a canopy. We could always drive to the bathroom - and in the meantime the kids were just fine peeing behind bushes. They'd already rushed off to do that as soon as we got there. And yeah, the burned vegetation was unfortunate, but we were still within a short walk of the beach. 

Brandon and the kids told me that they loved the campsite. (They could tell I was starting to panic.) We got out the tent and put that up. The evening was pretty windy and also misty, but we didn't have rain yet. 

Brandon worked to support the tent with extra rope and stakes. The kids and I blew up the air mattresses with the pump that connected to the car. We got the mattresses, the sleeping bags, and our clothes bags into the tent. 

At some point while we were setting up camp we noticed the coyotes. There were two of them. At first they looked like dogs walking through the burned out brush. But as they got closer we realized they were coyotes. 

That immediately cancelled any more peeing behind bushes. I told the kids that they were safe as long as we stayed in a group. 

I was thinking, "Could this campsite get any worse?"

We were supposed to have hot dogs for dinner, but we wanted to put up the canopy before we tried to cook anything. Brandon wanted more stakes to support the canopy so he said he would go back to Walmart to buy those. I was like, "Um, if we are driving all the way back into town, we should just go to a restaurant for dinner."

The kids loved that idea so they were instantly in the car.   

We drove to a Wendy's and Brandon ordered the food while I went to the bathroom. I really did need to use the bathroom, but I also needed a minute to pull myself together. I told myself, "Look, it's a bad campsite, but tomorrow you are going to wake up on the beach. It's going to be beautiful. It will all be worth it"

Here are the kids at Wendy's. 

And me and Brandon. Look at that forced smile on my face. 

We drove back to the campsite and the kids' earlier optimism was fading. We were driving by lots of hotels and the kids were all like, "Can we just get a hotel?"

I told them no because all our stuff was still at the campsite. 

We passed a man who looked a little homeless. For some reason I thought, "Oh we should help him out?" And then I laughed. How would we help him out? Take him back to our $12 campsite and let him sleep on the table?  I told Brandon and we had a good laugh picturing the guy being like, "Thanks, but no thanks."

Back at the campsite we grabbed our pajamas and drove over to the bathroom to change our clothes and brush our teeth. Outside the bathhouse Brandon found a crab in the grass. 

We went back to the tent and got comfortable. Brandon stayed up teaching a card game to the girls. 

Derrick and I were sleepy so we laid down on our air mattress. Usually Brandon and I sleep on an air mattress in the middle of the tent. Charlotte and Lydia share a mattress on one side and Derrick and Veronica share another mattress on the other side. 

But I changed the order this time. We put Charlotte and Lydia in the very middle. Then Brandon and I each slept on the outer edges of the tent. We did this because the tent tends to cave in a bit when the wind blows. I didn't want any of the kids dealing with that in the night. I figured Brandon and I could handle that without complain. So I was sharing with Derrick and Brandon was sharing with Veronica. 

Derrick and I talked a little bit and then drifted off to sleep. 

I woke up around 4:00 AM to a lot of wind blowing the tent. As I'd expected the side of the tent was pushing onto me. There was water dripping down on me, but I couldn't tell if the tent was leaking or it there was just a lot of mist condensing on the inside of the tent and then falling down as the wind flexed the fabric. There were also a lot of flashes of lightning. 

As far as I knew I was the only one awake so I just kind of laid there. I was happy none of the kids seemed to know there was a storm. 

AT 4:09 Brandon texted me. We were sleeping on opposite sides of the tent so this was the best way to communicate. (The screenshot says 3:09, but that's because I screenshotted it when we were back in the Mountain Time Zone. This was happening in the Central Time Zone so it was 4:09.)

He's the black bubbles. I'm the blue. 

He was worried about the lightning hitting our tent. So he was asking about moving to the car. I was more concerned about not waking up the kids. I didn't want them to panic. 

I hadn't thought about getting struck by lightning until Brandon brought it up. I'd been thinking about how happy I was that there weren't any trees around. I would have been more worried about a tree falling on us in all the wind. 

And so far the lightning was just flashing. There wasn't any thunder accompanying it. 

At 4:19 I heard thunder. But Derrick was still laying calmly next to me. Veronica was still asleep. The thought of moving to the car did not sound nice. 

Brandon has a more complicated weather app than me so he was looking at the storm via radar. At first he thought we'd be fine, but then he realized he was looking at the wrong spot. He noticed the storm was actually heading right toward us. Everything that was going on so far was just the storm front. 

We've weathered storm squalls in the past. There was a bad one at a State Park in Florida once. And we made it through that - with much younger kids. 

But this storm was turning out to be much worse than that squall line. One of our problems was that Brandon anchored the tent against the wind that was blowing from the beach - to the south. But during the night the wind had shifted. Now the wind was blowing from the east. The poles on that side of the tent didn't have any extra help. 

As the wind blew more violently our poor tent was left to bend and flex in the wind with no extra help. 

At 4:35 I texted Brandon if we should go to the car.  I'm not sure he even looked at that text. The tent started caving in on him and he was holding it up against the wind with his leg. Charlotte and Lydia were awake and were also trying to hold the tent up.

There were intense lightning flashes and booming thunder. 

The tent was leaking huge drops of water. 

Derrick and Veronica were awake. 

I lay there praying for the safety of my poor misguided family. 

When the tent folded in on us all for a second we knew there was no sense trying to stay there anymore. We RAN for the car. 

I grabbed my boots and ran to the car in my socks. My socks were soaked immediately. We all got so wet from the rain. Our car was only a few feet from the tent, but we were all very wet by the time we got there. 

Everyone had to go to the bathroom so instead of weathering the rest of the storm at our campsite we drove over to the bathroom. When I'd gone to sleep the night before I'd been worried about any early morning bathroom runs. Now it was the least of my problems. 

We all ran into the bathroom and used that and then ran back out to the car - getting soaked in the process. So we turned on the car and cranked the heat. The heat was more for our wet clothes than any actual need. The one good thing about this storm was that it wasn't cold. It was just wet.

Then we just kind of sat there and watched the storm. One of the kids said we should do a Marco Polo and I was like, "No, this is the stuff you show after you survive. Not in the middle of it."

But I did think it was a good idea to record a video of us. You can see the lightning flashing and hear the thunder. You can also hear Charlotte saying that I should NEVER try to camp in Galveston again.

The storm wasn't going anywhere anytime soon so neither were we. The tablet was in the car (THANK GOODNESS we'd had the sense to leave it there instead of bringing it into the tent) so the kids started watching Super Mario Brothers. Brandon and I tried to get back to sleep. I think I slept a little bit. 

After a while I woke up and considered our options. The campsite had been bad from the beginning. And we'd just had our worst night camping ever. I wasn't sure we could convince the kids to sleep in the tent ever again - let alone that night. And I wasn't really interested at staying at our campsite the two more nights that I'd booked. 

I got onto Hotels.com just to see what was available. I wasn't super serious about abandoning our campsite for a hotel - yet. So I was just doing a basic search for 2 adults. The room rates that were popping up were super low. I was seeing rooms for $40. 

So I decided to get crazy and see what was available for 6 people. So far on the trip we'd been paying a little less than $100 a night per room. And since we hadn't found any places that held 6 people we'd been getting two rooms. So that's a little less than $200 per night. I couldn't believe it when I started to see options for rooms that would fit all 6 of us - for less than $100 per night. 

I ended up picking one for $70 per night! It had two rooms and a kitchenette. Plus breakfast was included. I'd forgot an important fact about Galveston. There are a lot of hotels on the island. During the summer and weekends they will all get booked. But on weekdays they often have empty rooms. They'll cut rates drastically in order to get people to stay there. And they will really cut rates at the last minute. 

It was the Wingate by Wyndham Galveston East Beach (I'm writing this down so I remember.) I booked it right away. The kids were so happy when I told them we were going to be in a hotel the next two nights. 

The sky got lighter and so we decided to go check on our tent. So we drove back over there. The tent had partially collapsed. Later, when we took the rainfly off, we discovered that one of the poll sections had completely splintered. (The kids keep saying "the tent pole broke" and it sounds just like, "the temple broke" so I keep being like, "WHAT????") 

The inside of the tent was COVERED in water. There were huge puddles of water.  Brandon bailed the water out with a cup. When he was done he was like, "Well, that was new." 

Everything that had been on the floor of the tent was completely soaked. Most of the bags had been on the air mattresses so they were okay. But mine and Veronica's bags had been on the floor. All the clothes in my bag were soaked. I was so glad I decided against bringing my laptop on this trip because I always keep my laptop in the back pocket of my backpack. I picked up Veronica's bag and water streamed out of it. So I set it on the picnic bench so the water could drain out. 

Lydia had been smart and brought her sleeping bag with her into the car. Everyone else had left theirs. They were in various stages of wet. Most were only wet on the outside from the rain. But there was at least one that was wet all the way through. 

After assessing the damage we were like, "Well let's go see the beach."  So we left our stuff on the bench and walked over to the beach. I told Brandon, "I feel bad that we are making people thing that people from Maryland are such bad campers."

Here's the burned vegetation on the way to the beach. 

And here's the trail down to the beach. I swear there used to be a bathroom here. What happened?

We followed the trail.

And found the beach. And you know, in spite of the storm and our broken tent and wet stuff, this was everything I'd hoped it would be. Here we were, within close walking distance of the beach, exploring it in the early morning. 

I was reminded of meme that says something like, "Look at the weather acting all cute like it didn't try to kill us last night."

Derrick was so happy to finally see the ocean. (I know, technically it was the Gulf of Mexico, but whatever.)

It was so pretty.

We all went down to the water and let it run over our feet. (Actually, now that I think about it, I didn't. I was wearing my boots.)

Here I am. 

All of us.

We were hungry so we went back to the campsite to make breakfast. 

All the stuff was still piled on top of our table so I had Brandon set up the stove on the table at the empty campsite next to us. I made pancakes and scrambled eggs. 

There were seagulls flying around so we tried to eat fast before they noticed our food. 

At the very end we were surrounded by Seagulls. 

I walked over to the dumpster to throw away some trash. Here's the look back at our row of campsites. There had been another tent camper in addition to us and there were two or three trailers. 

Brandon set up the canopy and strung cord all over it to add extra clothes lines. We hung our sleeping bags and some of the wet clothes out to dry. I also went into the tent and wiped down the floor as best I could with a blanket. Then I propped up the three air mattresses so they could dry. 

I'd been considering going to the laundry mat in Jamaica Beach (I knew it was there thanks to our last visit.) But really everything we needed dried was drying on those clothes lines. And the clothes that were soaked in the bags could wait until we were at our hotel. 

So really there was nothing left to do, but enjoy the beach. Technically we still had the campsite for two more nights so it's not like we had to leave anytime soon. So I got the swimming suits and towels out of the van's underseat storage. We drove to the bathroom to change and then drove back and went down to the beach.  

The kids were so excited to play in the water. 

Charlotte and Lydia started making a sand castle. 

I tried to take a nap on the beach for a while. 

Brandon was next to me - those are his sandals in the picture. 

Eventually I got up.

Derrick showed me some hermit crabs that he was finding.

Here's the crab on the sand.

Derrick was so fascinated by them.

More picturesque scenes. 

Lydia showed me a jelly fish that was washed up on shore.

The kids were out in the water having a great time. They look like they are in deep, but really they were just sitting on the sand. 

Here's Derrick.

Charlotte and Lydia's castle got more elaborate. 

Here's the zoomed our view. 

All four kids went out and played in the water again. 

I went down there too after a while. The water was cold, but you got used to it.

I'd given the kids boogie boards for Easter. They had a lot of fun with those.

After a while I decided that I should go back up to the campsite and check on everything. I was picturing everything blown off our make shift clothesline. 

Things were still on the clothesline when I got there. I decided to start getting things a little organized. So I started stuffing the sleeping bags back into the bags and just kind of getting other things put together. 

As I worked, the wind started blowing harder. So I'm glad I got there when I did. 

Brandon and the kids came back up from the beach and we had a makeshift lunch of snacks and things. 

Then we got to work on taking everything down and packing the car. Here's everything sitting outside the car waiting to get packed. 

After everything was packed we drove over to the bathroom one last time so the kids could get some sand off. 

I called the hotel to see if we could get an early check it. They had a check in time of 4:00 and it was about 2:30 at this point. The front desk agent said that he would waive the early check in fee. So we started driving toward the hotel. The hotel was about a 25 minute drive from the campsite. Derrick and Veronica fell asleep on the way. 

Checking into the hotel was an adventure. The front desk agent was so busy. While I was there he had to check in someone ahead of me, make more keys for one other guest, and answer the phone like 5 times. When the phone rang for like the 6th time we joked that by the time he was done getting me checked in it would be 4:00.

Anyway, we eventually got everything all set. He told me, "Okay, all that was the good news. Here's the bad news. You are on the third floor and we don't have an elevator."  I told him that was fine. Honestly I was just so happy to have walls. 

I went out to the car and we parked. Then we all carried our stuff up the three flights of stairs to our room. 

Entering that room was AMAZING. It was so big!

Here's the main room. It had a king size bed, a couch, and a small bench/table. 

Then there was a whole second room with two full size beds. 

And the VIEW was incredible. This hotel was directly across from the seawall beach. Our room was directly across the street from the beach. And we faced the beach on two sides. 

Everyone took turns taking showers.  As each kid finished their shower they would climb into the bed to keep watching TV. I'd been okay about having the kids wear sun screen, but we'd missed some spots and so everyone had at least one bad sunburn spot. Thankfully I'd packed our aloe gel stuff so I made sure everyone got some of that after their showers. 

Brandon and I found the onsite washer and dryer and started drying a load of wet clothes while washing the swim suits. We also washed another load of clothes that needed to be washed anyway. The washer worked okay, but the dryer didn't work. So Brandon ended up taking everything to a laundry mat to be dried. 

When he came back we had hot dogs for dinner. We cooked them in the microwave.

The kids really wanted to swim in the hotel pool so Brandon took them down there after dinner. I stayed in the hotel room and took care of some computer stuff. 

The pool wasn't very warm so the kids weren't down there very long. They came back and everyone got into pajamas. It was only like 7:30, but we were pooped. So everyone went to bed - well almost everyone. Brandon was still wired. He'd already taken one walk along the beach that afternoon while waiting for the laundry. He was loving the beach town atmosphere so he went out walking on the beach for another hour or so. 

Anyway, this day had not turned out how I expected it to. Before bed the night before I'd told everyone, "tomorrow we aren't leaving this state park and we aren't spending any money all day." 

Ha Ha Ha

But even though we'd had a terrible night it had all turned out okay. And now that it's been three weeks since we survived that crazy storm we all laugh when we talk about what happened. It's one of the most memorable parts of our super awesome vacation. 

But seriously, future Valerie, don't plan to camp at Galveston Island State Park ever again.