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Moving to Crescent City Part 4: Galveston

I know what you're thinking. Galveston is also in Texas, so why the separate entry? Because Galveston is a little more special than the rest of Texas. It's the home of the Timmerman's, Kyle and Jenn, whose wedding I blogged about last March. In fact, you can see their home in the photo right above... that adorable white building in the heart of Galveston's downtown. Since Kyle and Jenn were so hospitable and allowed us to pause in our trip and spend an extra night there, we had a lot to do and see. I'm not going to be able to give my visit there the blog entry it deserves, though, because I'm still knee-deep in lesson planning and should really be reading up on money, banking, blah blah blah to share with the kiddos tomorrow, but I'm getting behind on my blog and I want to FINALLY catch you all up so I can start posting about New Orleans. Thus, a blog of mostly photos. Maybe that's best afterall.

Here are some more shots of Galveston from a parking structure.

The city/island is much bigger than I expected it to be and it was the perfect transition from Texas to New Orleans. In fact, I think Galveston is almost like a smaller New Orleans. It's got Mardi Gras and spring breakers looking to get wasted. It's got beautiful houses built on stilts. It's got great little shops. I was pleased with the city. The whole time, though, I kept thinking of the opening line from Donald Barthelme's short story "I Bought a Little City," which you can hear on the New Yorker Fiction podcast I blogged about once before.

Our first morning in Galveston, we walked along the Strand and visited shops. I found the statues that I always wanted as a little girl and never got. Remember these?

In Galveston, you have to walk up steps to get to the sidewalk.

Then we went to seawall and looked out at the Gulf of Mexico.

It was nice to be at the beach again. I think it's been 3 or 4 years. I was wishing I had brought my swimsuit. Technically, I did have my swimsuit. It was packed somewhere in my car with the rest of my belongings. But just sitting on a lawn chair under an umbrella was good enough.

Then we went on a walk to look at all the pretty houses in Galveston.

Here are some other sights from our walk:

That evening, after a delicious dinner, we played some mini golf.

I lost. But I also won a free game. Guess who got a hole-in-one on the last hole? Me. Bells started ringing, I jumped up and down, high-fives were passed and I got this little card.

Sadly, our time in Galveston came to an end much to quickly. The next morning, we took a ferry across the harbor to Port Bolivar to continue our trek to New Orleans.

I know you can't really see them in this picture, but there are porpoises following that boat! We same them jumping around.

You can tell the houses near Port Bolivar are ready for hurricanes and flooding. Most of the houses in New Orleans are built on stilts or at least shored higher, but these houses were so high up. I can't imagine bringing in the groceries.

And then we drove across the swamps of Louisiana and down into NoLA. More on that later.