Zach, Shabree and I left for a full day of letterboxing today. We
left around 11am for Goliad to visit the La Bahia Mission State Park
and find SILVER EAGLE'S MEXICO FLAG from the Six Flags Over Texas
series. We toured the mission and the museum, put $1.02 in the penny
imprinting machine, looked about the grounds, then started off on
the clues to the letterbox. Unfortunately the nature trail was
blocked off with warning tape. We went back to the visitor's center
and asked about it, because I hoped there was an alternate entrance
to the trail. But they said, that the trail was completely closed
down, due to major damage from Hurricane Claudette. Besides the
trees that are broken or uprooted, the bridge on the trail was blown
or knocked off it's base somehow. :(

So we drove on down the road to the Presidio La Bahia and General
Zaragosa's home. There we had no trouble at all locating BABY BEAR'S
REMEMBER GOLIAD letterbox. It was in good shape. I was about the 5th
signer, I think.

Then we drove over to the ghost port town of Indianola. This was the
first time we had been there, and after reading up on the exciting
but tragic history of the previously bustling place, I was glad to
finally spend some time there. We admired the VERY tall stone statue
of La Salle, and claimed a picnic table before trying to find SILVER
EAGLE'S FRENCH FLAG letterbox, also in the Six Flags over Texas
series. We had a somewhat difficult time at first, because of what I
assume is more Hurricane Claudette damage. There were small or
medium sized limbs over and in the place where I thought the
letterbox must be. I had to remove most of them to get to the place
where the box was. But we finally got to the box and brought it back
to the table so we could do our stamping. Opening it, it had about a
one fourth cup of water inside. So I dried the inside of the box
off, and dried the book off the best I could too. It was soaked on
one edge and up two corners. But I let the pages ruffle in the sea
breeze the whole time we were there, which helped also, before
returning it to it's hiding place again. We were only the third
signers in that one. The kids loaded up on shells as a bonus! ;)

Then we drove back and hooked up to the interstate again, and drove
to Aransas Wildlife Refuge to look for two more letterboxes. First
we searched for FUNHOG'S HOG LAKE WHOOPER. We hiked down the grassy
trail, stopping before many steps to re-spray ourselves with
mosquito repellant. The grasslands turned into woods, and there were
so many wonderful things growing and blooming there bright purple
beauty berry, red Turk's cap, etc. really GREAT stuff! We got to
the lake and walked out on the pier to look down on a HUGE
alligator!!! This alligator was around the size of one of the
crocodiles Steve Irwin harasses! GULP! Zachary worried that he might
attack us, and indeed the pier was only inches above the water.
However, it had `walls' on it up to the handrail. The alligator was
resting, but his nostrils flaired for awhile sniffing us for a
possible food source, as we were only about three feet up from him,
looking directly down at him. I warned the kids not to disturb him,
or get the idea to poke him with the hiking stick or something.
Somewhat disappointed (!!!!), they wanted to know, "Why not?". I
pointed out that he was content where he was now, and the shore was
only about 8 feet behind us at the most did we want him to decide
to leave the water and come ashore???! With that, we left the pier
to continue with the clues. Unfortunately, the grassy verge we were
supposed to follow, was blocked off with a big `Do Not Enter' sign.
I wondered if it was because of hurricane damage or more likely, I
thought, that the shoreline there had become much too popular with
large, sharp toothed reptiles!

So we retraced our steps back to our van parked at the trailhead. I
got in the van only to see a tick crawling on my shirt. Yuck! I
warned the kids to be vigilant in checking themselves for ticks.
Then we drove farther into the Wildlife Refuge and came to the area
where SILVER EAGLE'S ARANSAS WHOOPER Letterbox was hidden. It is one
of the Texas Birding Trail Series. We went to the end of the long
boardwalk trail, then along the very grassy trail and cut into the
Big Tree Trail, but by that time it was getting late, and when I
calculated that the fairly long distance we had already covered was
only about halfway (one way) in the hike, I decided to turn back
and wait for another day to return. We were all a little worried
about javalina attacks in such a thickly wooded area at dusk. Zach's
great grandmother had been accosted and chased by a pack of them not
long ago, just walking on their country property from their business
office, down the long driveway to their house.

We were really tired, and it was close to dark anyway, and so rather
than continue on to Goose Island to try to find SILVER EAGLE'S BIG
TREE letterbox, that we weren't successful in finding before, we
started for home. In the Refuge, we had seen one HUGE alligator, 8
deer (a buck, 5 does and 2 fawns), 3 turkeys, and lots of varieties
of other birds and butterflies. The only further excitement was when
Shabree suddenly started screaming and jumping over the last seat in
the van, writhing in terror. She had a `bug' on her. I pulled over
to the roadside, looked her over, and took a tick off of her pants
and threw it out the window. Wow!!!

We got home around 9pm, and hope to go back to Goose Island and the
Aransas Wildlife Refuge next Saturday. We had a really great day!
Thanks Silver Eagle, Baby Bear and Funhog!!! :)