The First Month on the Road-Corpus Christi TX
We spent most of April in Corpus. Yes, I know that was many weeks ago! Why Corpus? My mother and her husband live there and we really wanted to visit with them for a while prior to leaving the state for good after school ends. Secondly, it’s a beach town, so it felt like a great place to retreat to for the better part of April.
I’m no travel writer, nor do I claim to be an expert on anything. However, if you are interested in what we did, where we visited, and what my general opinion on all that is, here ya go…
The Weather
It kinda sucked! I had done my research prior and was under the impression that April was typically a nice month in Corpus with temps in the high 70’s to low 80’s with an average of 2 or so days of rain. Well… Thank you Texas for standing your ground across the state and delivering your typical, “each day is a surprise” springtime weather. Being a coastal area windy days and pop up showers are the norm, but damn it was windy! Also, very cloudy and very chilly more days than I cared for! It was really nice weather maybe 4–5 days during our stay.
The Traffic
Having lived in DFW (Dallas/Fort Worth)practically my entire life has really groomed me to easily deal with traffic, agressive drivers, dumb drivers, and basically any and all construction situations.We travel a lot and I have yet to find a place that was “too much” or “too stressful” to navigate. Sure, some places have their quirks. If I remember correctly, it was Jacksonville, FL. that had strange intersections that kept throwing me off and the lane-sharing with motorcycles in Los Angeles totally freaked me out at first. I’m telling ya… I will not miss driving in Corpus!
My take on Corpus? Holy shit, the construction and drivers there are stupid! People were assholes! Not necessarily aggressive, but more on the oblivious side I feel like. Albuquerque drivers used to be my nemesis but now I am leaning towards Corpus Christi drivers. Clearly it was not everyone, so don’t get your panties in a wad if you live there and are not a dumb driver. Just move along, I’m not talking about you.
The Beach
We only visited the beach on Padre Island, which is Texas’s largest barrier island, and apparently the world’s longest barrier island (I did a quick google search). Corpus Christi is located at the northern part of the island. We really enjoy the beaches there. The water is clean compared compared to many other Texas beaches we’ve visited. The beach is well kept with lots of nice big trash recepticles to help visitors keep it that way. The fact that you can drive on this Texas beach is one of my favorite things about it. We just packed up the back of the Jeep and go find an open spot without having to lug all our stuff from a parking lot across the dry sand to the beach.
Things to do
Corpus has a decent amount of things to do! During our trip we visited the Texas State Aquarium, which was a hit with the kids. It’s a good sized aquarium with some fun interactive animal exhibits mixed in. If you want to know more, go check it out for yourself, https://texasstateaquarium.org.
We also went to the South Texas Botanical Gardens and Nature Center. Neither me or the boys were very impressed with the gardens. However, we’ve been to some of the best botanical gardens so our expectations might be a little skewed. It also didn't help that Corpus had just experienced an unprecedented freeze about a month earlier and many of the native plants took it very hard. It took us about 30 minutes to walk through, and that was enough. Go check them out… http://stxbot.org
The Texas Sea Life Center was a great place to visit! We all enjoyed getting to know about their rescues and their cause. You can go do a short 45 minute tour and learn all about the turtles, birds, reptiles, and other animals that they care for there. Some animals are there for good and others they are able to rehabilitate and release back into the wild. I will likely go back and visit each time I’m in the area. Check them out… https://www.texassealifecenter.org
We ate at lots of delicious places and visited a few breweries while there also. My favorites were, Padre Island Burger Company, Lorelei Brewing, the Excecutive Surf Club, and the Railroad Seafood Station and Brewing Company. There are more, but those were my favorites!
If you ever spend some time in Corpus Christi, hit me up and let me know what you like/dislike! I’d love to know.
XOXO,
Jera