Hey friends, welcome back to Grand Adventure! I'm your host Marc Guido
and this week we are in Port Aransas, on the Coastal Bend of Texas on Mustang Island.
We're here to relax with some very dear friends along the beach for a week,
but while we're here we're also going to tour a World War II-era aircraft carrier, and also
do something uniquely Texan: we're going to go watch some belt sander racing! So stay tuned.
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Port Aransas sits at the northern end of Mustang Island, one of the many barrier islands lining
the Gulf of Mexico along the Texas Coast. You can get there via a bridge from Padre Island,
but as we're approaching from the East we're saving ourselves many miles and a trip through
downtown Corpus Christi by taking the ferry from Aransas Pass, operated by the Texas Department
of Transportation. Not only does this ferry run 24 hours per day but it's also free of charge,
even for travelers like us towing a fifth wheel,
although RVers should be aware that a maximum vehicle height of 13 feet 6 inches is allowed.
They're running four or five boats concurrently from multiple docks,
so there's only a minimal wait to get on board to cross the Corpus Christi Ship Channel.
Our friends Ed and Ann with the YouTube channel Homie At Large, as well as our Salt Lake City
friends Dale and Pat, and Dale's sister Carol are all staying here at Pioneer RV Beach Resort,
so we're joining them for this week to simplify socializing with our friends.
Pioneer offers 361 full hook-up RV sites, all of which have level concrete pads including cable TV,
wireless Internet, and trash pickup. Amenities include a convenience store, a recreation hall
with coin operated pool tables and video games, two swimming pools, a hot tub, coin laundry
and a boardwalk to the beach. We're spending $295 plus electricity for our week in a premium
pull-through site. We found our neighbors to be welcoming and Pioneer's staff to be exceptional.
They even delivered an overnight mail envelope that we had shipped to the RV park
right to our door. Now that's what we call customer service!
Staying in the same RV park as our friends makes it easy to get together in the evenings
for a fun game of Mexican Train by the pool,
or dining nearby at one of our favorite Texas Gulf Coast seafood shacks, Snoopy's Pier.
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Port Aransas, or Port A to locals, has been a popular vacation town since the 1920s, and today
its population of roughly 3,500 can swell to as much as 60,000 on a busy summer weekend. It was
a favorite location of pirates in the early 19th century. Capt. Jean Lafitte and his buccaneers
spent time on the Texas coast; Galveston owed its start to him and Mustang Island was one of his
favorite haunts to make camp and, according to legend, a place to hide their treasure.
Port Aransas suffered major damage as a result of the direct landfall of category
4 Hurricane Harvey in August 2017, with wind speeds of 132 mph recorded on the island.
Nearly every structure in Port Aransas was damaged, some severely, while significant
damage from storm surge also occurred. Townspeople have been busy rebuilding ever since, and there is
still evidence of the hurricane visible along Port A's streets if you look closely enough.
You can drive on the beach on Mustang Island, and the sand is mostly firmly packed.
Parking on the beach requires a beach parking permit available at the Chamber of Commerce
and most stores around town at a cost of $12 per year.
Boondocking on the beach is allowed here, and the further north you travel along the beach
the wider the beach becomes, leaving ample room between your RV and the high tide line.
While boondocking on adjacent Padre Island in 2019, one area attraction we ran out of
time to explore is the USS Lexington, a floating museum aboard a World War II-era aircraft carrier.
We're returning today with Dale, Pat and Carol to correct that mistake.
Nicknamed "The Blue Ghost", the Lexington is an Essex-class aircraft carrier built during
World War II in the Fore River Shipyard in Quincy, Massachusetts for the U.S. Navy. The
ship has been docked in Corpus Christi since 1992, where it's been retrofitted as a museum.
The Blue Ghost saw extensive service throughout the Pacific Theater in World War II. The Lexington
was decommissioned following the war, but was modernized and reactivated in the early 1950s
as an attack carrier based in Pensacola, Florida. She was decommissioned again
in 1991 following a longer service life than any other Essex-class ship,
and was donated to the City of Corpus Christi for her new life as a museum.
Touring the Lexington starts with a 3D film in a MEGAtheater built in the ship's forward aircraft
elevator space on the hangar deck before exploring other areas including the focsle,
catapult room, bridge, crew and captain's quarters, flight deck and more.
It's enjoyable touring the ship, but we frankly wish that more of the museum displays were
related to the Lexington itself, rather than other ships and military groups that served beside her.
Plan on spending a good three or four hours to get through it all.
After hearing stories from Homie at Large, we can't help but visit the Gaff,
a popular local bar in the center of Port Aransas to watch a uniquely Texas phenomenon.
While the interior of the bar is festive and inviting,
it's here out this back door where all of the action takes place...
...for the Gaff is the de-facto home of Texas Belt-Sander Racing.
Belt sanders may have been one of the first power tools used in the growing field of power tool
drag racing. The sanders used have been heavily modified by competitors to achieve maximum speed,
and whimsically decorated.
The tools are placed in parallel wooden channels and fitted with long extension cords.
Each heat begins when individual switches triggered by the racers
energizes them, causing the sanders to race towards the end of the 75-foot track,
spitting wood dust along the way. The fastest time ever recorded on a 75-foot track
was 2.21 seconds recorded by Dudley Harper's Sudden Death Racer of San Marcos, Texas at the
Legends Raceway in nearby Rockport, reaching a speed of 50–60 miles per hour at the finish line.
Of course, the Gaff is filled on this Saturday afternoon with spectators watching the action,
and bar owner Kip is enjoying brisk food and drink sales.
Many of these competitors spend their winters where we're staying at Pioneer RV Beach Resort,
and they've even built a belt sander race track at the RV park for informal competition and testing.
So we truly hope that you've enjoyed visiting Port Aransas on Mustang Island, Texas with us!
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