They Took The Padre Out Of South Padre

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They Took The Padre out of South Padre!

INDEX TO PAST PAGES

The South Padre Skyline

"Que Padre!"  That Spanish phrase does not mean "What, father!"  It means "WOW!"  "This is really good!"

First Came The Turtle Lady, Now The Birding Center

South Padre Island and the city by the same name forms the tip of the Texas Riviera where young people from all over the US flock during spring break.  In the old days the big player in town was Frankie Realty who controlled many of the rental properties.  There was the Blue Marlin Market, and still is, and of course, the turtle lady, Ill Fox Loetscher, R.I.P.  In those days you could see the turtles in her home located on Gulf Boulevard.  A foundation carries on in her name.

Sea Ranch Marina, Ecco Tourism

A better term for South Padre Island might be "Que Rico", which translates into "Delicious".  Except this time I am using the term "Que Rico" in it's literal sense. This is a place for the rich. Gone from South Padre Island is it's sweet innocence from the Turtle Lady days.  In it's place is a major tourist trap guarded by a legion of local police cruising the streets in expensive SUV's.

Vestiges Of a Bygone Era And A

Message Never Learned

They even have high tech cameras on the beach to watch your every move.  Every once in awhile the camera flashes, making you think a run on the beach is like running a red light.  At sundown, everyone pours off of the beach reminding beach goers this is rental property owned by Uncle Sam, not a beach resort. Uncle Sam wants a quiet beach at night, so he boots his tenants out.

"Throw trash, pay the price", the sign does not exist in English

It was bound to happen sooner or later.  Money greases the wheels of progress.  It takes deep pockets to build the kind of infrastructure that has helped the South Padre Island paradise grow.  As the local population watches their paradise over-run by too much of a good thing, they try to hang onto the innocence by mandating rules and regulations.  A wall of police and cameras peering at your every move doesn't protect the innocence, they destroy it.  Such is the nature of progress in our high tech world.


As resorts go, the city of South Padre Island remains quaint as a tourist town.  They have a huge task in front of them if they have any hope of hanging on to what set South Padre Island apart from all the rest of the beach resorts.

Cigar Store, South Padre Island, Texas

NOTES ABOUT THE MISSING YACHT, NINA

Search Updates:  EVXX.COM

Remember, there is a fund raiser on September 7th, 2013, to help pay for the rescue of the lost sailors aboard the Nina.  The yacht went missing in the Tasman Sea off the coast of New Zealand on June 4th.  The official search has been suspended.  Texas Equusearch is a private search coordinator hired by the families to rescue the crew.  Donations are needed to pay for search aircraft as they comb the seas for Matthew Wootton, Evi Nemeth, Danielle Wright, Kyle Jackson, David Dyche, Rosemary Dyche and David Dyche IV.  The crew may be on the boat or in a life raft.