There's nothing left in Bolivar

For the drive to Illinois, we generally take the Galveston Ferry. I know I mentioned before about my stress about the ferry working, and what we might find on the other side. To add to this stress was the possibility that the ferry might not be running due to fog. We had several days in a row of fog that was so severe they had to temporarily close down the channel the day before our trip. Before leaving Ariel and Robert's apartment that morning, I called the ferry and was relieved to hear the channel was all clear for boat traffic.

When we left this time, we made it to Bolivar Peninsula around 7 in the morning. I was interested to see how the area had changed since Ike and boy was I in for a shock. There was nothing there. I mean sure, there were a few skeletons of buildings and homes and there was a spurt of street lined with vehicles that had obviously been pushed there by the storm surge. I was amazed to see cars overturned and halfway buried under the sand. I heard that when the sand was submerged, it turned into quick sand that sucked in anything heavy enough to sink. We saw that first hand.

Unfortunately, the fog was so bad that we could barely see beyond a block from the road we traveled. There was still standing water EVERYWHERE that had even overtaken a portion of the road. I was irritated I had to go 20 miles under the speed limit. It's a long drive dammit!

We saw one lot that looked like it was rebuilding, but they were raising the land first. I cannot imagine rebuilding out there. Even if you had land to build on, there was NOTHING around. No grocery stores, no gas stations, only one school unless you're willing to drive 30 to 40 minutes up the road. There was one restaurant that had already reopened. I can't imagine that business is very good for them.

Here's a look at what shots we could get in the fog:

I was hoping that we would be able to get some better shots on the drive back, but I forgot about the fact that there are no street lamps left to light the area. We got in around midnight, and to top it off it was foggy again. We noticed at the ferry landing that everything was still running off of generators. And of course, we were "randomly" chosen to have our vehicle searched. I was going to go off if they made us open the trunk. It was packed full to the ceiling, plus we had to make use of the roof rack for our luggage. Thankfully, they let that step slip and they just checked what they could. No drugs or guns in our car, by golly.

We made it the whole 18 hours home without one piece of luggage falling off the roof (unlike our last experience with using the roof rack). Travis, Robert and my dad wrapped everything in a tarp before tying it closed with rope and topping it off with ratchet ties. I think that stuff was pretty solid. The only downfall with tying crap to the roof is that our miles per gallon went down 3mpg!! That adds up over 1100 miles. It was worth it though. We brought so much stuff back from my mom's house (on top of all our Christmas gifts).

It was a great vacation!