Issue 560
Photo by Miles Merwin
FREE
The
Free
Island Moon
Weekly The voice of The Island since 1996
January 8, 2015
Around The Island By Dale Rankin
New Gambling Boat Arrives
editor@islandmoon.com
There is a new soundtrack for the New Year and it’s punctuated with coughs and sneezes. The flu season is upon us and The Island is wheezing. The number of cases is up about thirty percent across the state and an outdated flu vaccine may be to blame according to the medical types. The good news is that protocols put in place for the Ebola scare have helped hospitals cope with the jump in flu cases. It is truly an ill wind that doesn’t blow somebody some good.
Winter Texans A few Winter Texans have begun to straggle in this week. We still haven’t seen the RV Invasion we have experienced the past couple of years but just give it a week or so. You can tell how many Winter Texans are here by counting heads at The Gaff this Saturday afternoon for the Belt Sander Races. And just for the record it’s not true that people only go there to see belt sanders crash. They also go for Chicken Bingo.
The installation of a new traffic light on South Padre Island Drive at the Aquarius intersection hit a snag Tuesday night when the Island Strategic Action Committee, which last month voted to approve the light pending several conditions, pulled back and requested more information and some changes at the intersection before the light goes in.
Kyle Alston stands in front of the new 155 foot gambling boat, Jacks or Better By Ronnie Narmour
She’s a 155-fooot gambling boat that holds up to 250 people and will start making runs offshore in March, according to Tarpon Shores owner Kyle Alston. Alston says the boat was previously docked in Myrtle Beach,
She came cruising in through the jetties this week. Her name is Jacks or Better and her new home is the Tarpon Shores bait and beer stand located on the road between the Port Aransas ferry and Aransas Pass.
The owners of the boat are based out of Las Vegas and will offer two six-hour trips daily. The boat has two craps tables, a roulette wheel, and slots.
Statistics show that about 80% of the people who visit the Coastal Bend are here for the beaches and way the beaches are maintained is through the sale of beach permits. The stickers are good from January to January and allows access to area beaches except the Padre Island National Seashore, and Mustang Island State Park which charge separate fees. Approximately six miles of beach in Kleberg County, starting 1.2 miles south of Bob Hall Pier, do not require a sticker, and Mustang Island State Park charges a separate fee.
62 ! (
CORPUS CHRISTI BAY
BEACH ACCESS ROAD 2
P RE ERM QU IT IRE D
99 ! (
( ! 103
NO
The fish are biting, the weather is on and off, and Barefoot Mardi Gras is just a few weeks away. We’ll see you there. In the meantime say hello if you see us Around The Island.
PE RM IT ST (N ATE O P PE A RM RK IT )
Mustang Island Park
BEACH ACCESS ROAD 3
LAGUNA MADRE
NEWPORT PASS
( ! 196
(ENSTA TE TE RA PA NC R EF K EE )
The Corpus Christi Parks & Recreation Department now has 2015 Beach Parking Permits available for purchase. Permits are sold on the beach every week during the summer season, from Memorial Day to Labor Day, and year-round at the following locations: Stripes stores, local H-E-B stores, Academy Sports store, Central Cashiering at Corpus Christi City Hall, Naval Air Station-Corpus Christi/ITT Department, Corpus Christi Convention and Visitors Center, Nueces County Padre Balli Park Headquarters Office, and Texas Star (on Padre Island). This year, two more outlets were added to purchase the permits: CVS Pharmacy (Padre Island location only) and Dick’s Sporting Goods.
S (N TAT O E PE PA RM R IT K )
BEACH ACCESS ROAD 3-A
BEAC ACCESS ROAD 4
BEACH ACCESS ROAD 5 Padre Balli Park
( ! ! ( 230
GULF OF MEXICO
P RE ERM QU IT IRE D
234
BEACH ACCESS ROAD 6
NO
( ! 252
NO
( ! 253
PE
RM IT
P RE ERM QU IT IRE D
PE
RM IT
Frostbite Betty and Bert are back in town for the winter The drive from the Canadian border to the Gulf beach has not gotten any shorter, but we did make it in for a rockin' New Year's Eve on the Giggety's dance floor. What a way to shake out the miles from the road! And don'tcha know the weather up in Frostbite Falls turned to deep freeze just after we left.
South Carolina. It has four levels, one of which is non-smoking.
2015 Beach Parking Permits Are Available Now
We’ve included some Winter Texan stuff in this issue.
Frostbite Betty and Bert are back in Port A!
New Island Traffic Light Goes from Green to Amber
By Dale Rankin
Schlitterbahn One local television news operation kicked up some dust this week with a story under the headline, “Schlitterbahn in Financial Trouble.” What the headline should have said is “Schlitterbahn Owes Some Contractors Money.” As we reported here a couple of issues back the developers at the park are going through a refinancing due to the expanded scale of the park. Paul Schexnailder told the Island Strategic Action Committee Tuesday night that the park is still expected to be open this summer.
Update on Island projects
NO
PE
RM IT
Padre Island National Seashore
Beach Parking Zones
City of Corpus Christi, Nueces & Klebreg Counties Legend
! ( Beach Markers 196
Corpus Christi City Limits Nueces / Kleberg County Line 0
0.5
1
2
3
Miles 4
µ
The committee, which did not take a formal vote on the matter, stressed that changes to the intersection including an additional turn lane and warning signs on the JFK Causeway need to be done before the light is installed. The San Antonio real estate firm of Turner Busby Development owns nine acres on the east side of SPID at the location and has requested the light. The firm has plans to build a $30 million development called Packery Pointe which would include a 101 room motel 50,000 square feet of retail space, and a restaurant. Traffic Engineer, Gilmer Gaston, was hired by them to study traffic patterns at the site and determine the viability of placing a light there. Turner Busby has agreed to pay $300,000 for the light and signals on the JFK bridge to warn drivers that there is a light ahead.
Traffic Light continued on A6
Inside the Moon
Farah's Backwater A7
On the Rocks A7
For more information, please call 361-826-3423 or 361-826-3469, or visit www.ccparkandrec.com (click ‘Beaches’). We invite you to Live. Learn. Play!
Coordinate System: NAD 83 TX SP SC | Imagery: 2012 | T Tijerina | Oct 17, 2014 | BeachParkingZones.mxd
The Columbus Jinx Editor’s note: The following story first ran in the Indian Country Today Media Network. By Steve Russell
What we left behind We've been driving around the island checking on our familiar beaches and such; Bert noticed he is driving 20 mph in a 30 zone. "Look at that," he said, "I'm driving like a Winter Texan. I even have a Minnesota plate on the car." Ha, and this is after his previous fourteen years as a Coastal Bend-er. Y'all just give us a honk and a wave if you get stuck behind. Familiar friendly faces are everywhere we go. Plenty of "How ya doin'?" and "What was your summer like?" "Wanna get into MahJong?" "Can you show me that crafting thing from last year again, I forgot." As familiar as it feels here, I still had to ask directions to the mayonnaise in the IGA. Yup, we are loving it. Thanks for the friendly welcome, Port A!
Sports A8
Christoforo Columbo, most of us learn only as adults, was not Spanish. He would have been Italian if Italy had existed at the time. As it was, he was Genoan, a citizen of the Republic of Genoa. Because he would have sailed under a Spanish flag if Spain had existed in 1492, we consider his quest for a western route to India a Spanish undertaking. In fact, the marriage of Ferdinand II of Aragon to Isabella I of Castile had formed the political basis for the Spanish Empire and the Genoan hired hand known to them as Cristóbal Colón would provide the legal basis in “Christian discovery” of the “New World,” a concept the Roman Papacy would later wrap in moral authority. The man we misidentify as Christopher Columbus set out for a land he misidentified as India
Adventures with the TSA A14 Voyages of Columbus under a flag commonly misidentified as Spanish and proceeded to terrorize the Taino people who discovered him in the Caribbean. He never realized the riches or the status he coveted and his later life was snake bitten, jinxed. Whether Columbus was cursed literally by the Tainos he had
wronged cannot be known—they certainly cursed him figuratively— but he lived out his years in poor health and poverty, his life as much a jinx as his voyages. Some of the Columbus jinx recently rubbed off on the city of
History continued on A5
Live Music A16