Saturday was the day to take Janelle back to Galveston for the new semester at Texas A&M Galveston. I was anxious to ride along to investigate any remnants from Hurricane Ike if indeed there were signs of the September 2008 storm.
As soon as we were north of Houston there was evidence of the devastation. There were trees broken, signs and billboards damaged, many roofs with tarps still protecting them, and many incidences of roofing repair going on. Literally crews were working on the tops of many buildings as we drove past.
The first 'sign' of damage I noticed once on the actual island of Galveston was the demolished Golden Arches of McDonald's. You know something isn't quite right when a McDonald's sign is still damaged 4 months after a storm (given McDonald's desire to stay at the top of their game in all senses of the word). There are entire strip shopping centers in which the windows are boarded up and no businesses have rebuilt or moved in. There are still piles of trash along the streets. There are still uprooted trees laying undisturbed on their sides. Perhaps the most disturbing signs of Mother Nature's wrath were the boats of all shapes and sizes sitting in fields, against fences or buildings, on the side of the road, or any other place not exactly where a boat would typically be found.
One point of reference I intentionally visited is the pier where the cruise ships embark and disembark. There is a webcam atop one of the buildings along this pier and I check the site every day or so because it fascinates me to watch these ships depart "real time" while I sit hundreds of miles away. The camera went offline during and after the storm, but in recent weeks it has been brought back online and video is once again streaming. However, there is evidence of damage that I had been watching and needed to verify that the camera was indeed showing live shots. Yes, the damage remains. This is the pier adjacent to The Strand.
This picture was of interest. There is a taped line on the buildings in The Strand area indicating how high the water level surged during the storm. I am impressed with how the area has bounced back. Many of the shops and restaurants were reopened. Others were in various states of ongoing repair, still others were boarded shut and undisturbed from the fateful event. There was evidence of damage in unusual ways. The Strand is lined with natural gas lantern-like street lights. Some of these were snapped right off at the base. Parking along the street is premium in this shopping district so there are parking meters for payment of parking fees. As we went to deposit the required funds a kind gentleman approached us and told us that none of them were working... they had all been flooded during the surge and had not yet been repaired or replaced. Free Parking!
These are the sights that likely affected me the most, impacting all too clearly the power such a storm can wield. This hotel sits seemingly untouched since the storm. It is no longer accessible from the street because the driveway connecting the pier/hotel to the island is gone. You can still see cars in the parking lot that sit undisturbed since the day of the storm.
These posts sticking out of the water used to support restaurants and shops out over the water. I was amazed that the cement pylons buried deep in the sand of the beach had been uprooted as though they were flimsy twigs. Also noted (but undocumented in pixels because it was getting dark and I didn't want to carry the camera when we walked out on a slippery granite jetty) were the twisted, mangled hand railings that used to be on the stairs that lead from the street down the height of the seawall to the beach. Amazing is all I can say. Talk about a humbling experience to realize how helpless we are against the forces of nature.
But then, almost as if in atonement, there is this beautiful sky even though it was overcast and threatening to storm. I was taking pictures of the waves because they were uncharacteristically high and white-capping much farther out than usual. As I uploaded pics to the computer from the flash drive I smiled to see the beautiful purple, blue, gray, and green hues in the sky. Again, God does such good work when it comes to painting our world with color.
Until another time.....
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