Even in paradise, I guess, a little rain must fall sometimes. We are holed up from the great Texas chill of 2007 in Corpus Christi Texas. At least we don’t have the ice pellets included in our rain like they have a couple hundred miles north of here. You have probably seen the headlines for Missouri and that part of the country. They have a major ice storm and power outages. Right here it is 41 degrees and has dropped from 43 when we woke up, and 66 when we went to bed last night. The wind is coming at us from the east with gusts to about 25 mph according to the news. That is a good direction for us. It pushes the door closed instead of slamming it open and throwing us across the parking lot when we try to catch it.

When you think about it we are actually better prepared for power outages than the average. We like to have power, but we can easily survive for over a week without any outside services. We actually have four different ways to make electricity. The main engine, the gen-set, solar and the shore power if it is available. We have three ways to heat our house. Propane furnace, the gen-set or shore power running the space heater and we could run the engine and automotive heater in a pinch. We can cook on the propane stove, in the microwave and the charcoal Bar-b-que. Our one deficiency is that the insulating factor for this box is the pits. When it gets down to freezing the furnace runs every five minutes.

Yesterday was a blast, however. We did a twenty two mile bicycle ride and searched out three Geocaches. One Geocache site took us to a sea wall and promenade that we would never have found without encouragement from the search. One of the side benefits of Geocaching.

We started out from our camp on North Padre Island. Path, our trusty Green Dragon tandem recumbent bicycle was in fine spirits and rolled along nice and gentle in the light breezes coming off the Gulf of Mexico. The temperatures were a comfortable 70 degrees, and the humidity was a touch high. We rode across the bridge onto Mustang Island just to the North of Padre Island. Five miles out onto Mustang Island we visited the Texas State Park called Mustang Island. It was not much different from the county park we are staying in, but it is a good alternative location and they take reservations. For our camping friends their rates are $22 a night, $14 plus $8 for two people or you have to buy a Texas State Parks pass. Balli Park, where we are staying is $18 and you get seven days for the price of six. These are pretty good rates in this area where resorts get up to $35 a night. There is no pool or cable and no club house with poker at night either.

Now our home based friends might think these rates are a bit high, but take your property tax bill and add on your electric, (not counting heat) and your water bills and divide by 365. It’s not a bad trade for awaking to a different sunrise every few days.

Meanwhile back at the coach Judy is working on a quilt for the church and I am doing a little leather work and writing a blog of course.

We send along our love to all our friends and relatives back home and across the nation.

Gary and Judy