Happy Peep Day!

Easter Sunday dawned a bit overcast, but with temps in the high 60's. By mid-morning, the clouds/fog had disappeared, and the temperature was in the 70's and climbing. Welcome to the Gulf!

We thanked the good Lord for his sacrifices that prompt us to celebrate Easter, had a cup of coffee on the patio, and set about discovering what is what in Galveston. Turns out that Jamaica Beach, where we're staying, is in the West Beach section of Galveston Island, and the city proper is near East Beach. Go figure. Heading east on Seawall Blvd led us to the best beaches we've yet seen on this trip.

Several cruise lines use Galveston as a base for their Caribbean trips, and we saw a Norwegian Cruise Lines ship and a Carnival ship tied up.

This fuel barge was tied up next to the Carnival ship (see above), and then left, heading for the refinery down the bay.

At the port, among a number of out-of-service oil drilling platforms, is the Ocean Star Offshore Drilling Rig Museum.

Along the gangway to the museum, several pelicans relaxed in the warm sun.

The Ocean Star Museum shows the entire process used for extracting oil from the sea, and demonstrates with hands on exhibits just how sophisticated the process is. We learned how drilling platforms are fabricated for specific depths of water as well as for different types of geologic formations. After specialized ships create three dimensional graphs of the ocean floor, ofttimes tens of thousands of feet deep, the drilling platforms or ships are placed in position, and the work begins. This drill bit is one of several used for differing types of material.

From the pipe deck, the derrick is huge. Thirty foot lengths of pipe are screwed together to form ninety foot long pieces that are raised by cables and positioned for attachment to the pipe projecting from the drilling platform.

There are several different types of drilling platforms: ships that remain in position using computer operated thrusters to compensate for current and wind conditions; shallow water platforms use "legs" that are jacked into position on the ocean floor, stabilizing the platform, and floating platforms held in place with huge cables anchored to the ocean floor. If placed over the city of Houston, the chains would completely encompass the city and its suburbs! This link from one of those chains weighs 540 pounds and is about 3 feet in length.

The operation requires years of planning and millions of dollars of investment. Current daily rates are astounding.

A couple of Roughnecks gave us the boot off the drill rig!

As we left the port, heading east, we drove down The Strand, a collection of historic buildings in the old commercial district that have been repurposed into restaurants, bars, and T shirt shops.

The site of old Fort San Jacinto, at the extreme east end of Galveston Island, is a great place to check out the ships moving into the Intercoastal Waterway.

We stopped at the Island Fish Market for some fresh jumbo shrimp to have with our grilled steaks for dinner, and then looked at a new vacation home. It's built on pilings to avoid most of the storm surge that happens often in this area, and includes a balcony for watching the sunset over the Gulf of Mexico. Sadly, the realtor was not available this Sunday, so we had to take a pass on this one. Only 2 million (we'll keep looking).