Day Trips
Rockport captures the sea breeze and the hearts of visitors.
By Gerald E. McLeod, Fri., Dec. 24, 1999
Rockport captures the sea breeze and the hearts of visitors. Despite an influx of condos, fast food franchises, and assorted new business arrivals in recent years, the once-quiet fishing village has maintained a small-town ambiance that seems to move at a slower pace than the rest of the world.
The heart of the town is at the intersection of Business TX35 (to distinguish it from the TX35 Bypass) and Austin Street. A four-block strip of South Austin Street was once the town's thriving central business district. Restaurants, galleries, and gift shops have filled many of the storefronts. There is even an espresso bar in the back of the Estelle Stair Art Gallery at 406 S. Austin.
Stopping for a meal at Kline's Cafe has been a tradition along South Austin Street for decades. The cafe at 106 S. Austin serves delicious foods at reasonable prices. Of course, some visitors stop just to see Shorty Kline's John Wayne memorabilia collection filling a corner of the dining room or his array of clocks behind the counter. Serving steaks, seafood, Mexican food, and hearty breakfasts, the diner is open 5:30am-8pm to cater to the fishermen from nearby Rockport Harbor.
Overlooking the harbor at the corner of TX35 and South Austin Street, the Texas Maritime Museum tells the story of coastal sailors from shipwrecked Spanish explorers to modern shrimpers. Pirate ships, paddle-wheelers, and the sleek sailing ships of the Texas Navy are chronicled in the displays, many of which are hands-on for an interactive experience. The museum opens Tues.-Sat. 10am-4pm and Sundays 1-4pm.
Across the street from the museum are charter boats ready to take visitors on fishing trips or a tour of the coastline. More than 500 species of birds have been spotted in the area. On the migratory route between North and Central America, the Live Oak Peninsula is the last fueling stop for a treacherous trip across the Gulf of Mexico. The climate is so pleasant for humans and fowl that many decide to spend the winter months in the subtropical coastal area.
Rockport-Fulton became a world-famous birding location largely because of the work of an amateur ornithologist named Connie Hagar. She first visited Rockport in 1933 and returned to live there in 1935. She and her husband Jack owned eight vacation cottages at the corner of South Church and First streets.
It was from here that Ms. Hagar documented the importance of the coastal marshes to migratory birds. The sheer number of species of birds that she claimed to have seen astounded experts who often responded to her letters with disbelief. By 1943 she had convinced the world that this was the birding capital of Texas, and the state Legislature designated Little Bay between Rockport and Fulton as the Connie Hagar Wildlife Sanctuary.
Ms. Hagar passed away in 1973, but her legacy lives on. The site of her tourist cottages is now the Cottage Sanctuary a few blocks south of the central business district. The 6.25-acre wildlife refuge is laced with trails through thick undergrowth that is often filled with singing birds of almost every feather.
Hummingbirds descend on the area in the fall for their refueling stop, but the whooping cranes spend the winter along the coast in the Aransas Wildlife Refuge about 35 miles north of Rockport. The largest of the wading birds, the whoopers are an impressive sight. The refuge offers a large observation tower, several miles of hiking trails, and a 16-mile driving tour. Open daily 8am-4:30pm, there is no telling what animals you might see in the 54,829 acres of natural coastal habitat.
Closer to Rockport, Goose Island State Park occupies the tip of Lamar Peninsula at the conjunction of Copano, Aransas, and St Charles bays. Only 140 acres, the park is actually an island with plenty of beach area. Fishermen enjoy the park's lighted pier that stretches out into the bay and naturalists love to explore the hiking trails.
The Texas champion coastal live oak spreads its broad canopy overlooking the bay two miles north of the park. Estimated to be more than 1,000 years old, the Big Tree, as most people call it, is 44 feet tall, has a trunk 35 feet in circumference, a crown spread of 89 feet, and is thought to be among the oldest living trees in the nation.
Before 1931, residents of Rockport had to drive miles inland to get around Copano Bay to get to the Big Tree. That's when the mile-and-a-half-long Copano Causeway opened. Within three decades the 20-foot-wide bridge became obsolete for modern traffic, and the new LBJ Causeway opened in 1966.
The old causeway received a new lease on life after it was retired from the highway inventory. With the drawbridge in the middle of the causeway removed, it became two fishing piers operated by the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department. For fishermen and sightseers alike the old bridge makes a great place to watch the sunsets or sunrises.
One of the most unusual sites in the Rockport/ Fulton area is the Fulton Mansion State Historical Park. Once alone on a great expanse of open coastal shoreline overlooking Aransas Bay, the 6,200-square-foot home is now surrounded by homes and businesses along Fulton Beach Road. When it was built in 1874, the house sported all of the modern conveniences of the day, such as flush toilets, gas lighting, and a water cooling system to preserve perishable foods. Maintained by the state parks department, it is an intimate look at the best technology had to offer at the turn of the last century. (A few blocks north of the mansion off Fulton Beach Road at 61 Broadway is Hu Dat, the Chinese restaurant owned by the family of Dallas Cowboy and former Texas A&M All-American linebacker Dat Nguyen.)
Beaches, seafood, art, fishing, and wildlife make Rockport the other port on the Texas coast. For a list of accommodations and other information contact the visitor center at 800/242-0071 or at http://www.rockport-fulton.org.
