Goose Island

We continued our loop tour of the Texas Gulf Coast with our next stop being Goose Island State Park. Tracking the ghost of La Salle we arrived at the site of the birthplace of West Texas, Indianola, on the west coast of Matagorda Bay. It is north of here where Garcitas Creek flows into Lavaca Bay that La Salle placed his remaining settlers and meager supplies due to the loss of his two supply vessels. This ill fated colony founded in 1685 made it the first European settlement in Texas.

He then made two exploratory treks in the next three years. One went south up the Rio Grande to scout out the Spanish mines and one northeast in an attempt to find the Mississippi River, which due to lack of accurate nautical data, he had missed by over 400 miles. On the last foray he was killed by his men who mutinied near Navasota, Texas leaving his bones to the wolves and scavengers of the Texas prairie.

A model of Fort Saint Louis based on records from the Spanish who visited the site in 1689 shortly after the few remaining colonists were massacred by the Karankawa Indians. They buried the colonist’s remains and the eight French cannons that were part of the fort’s defenses before leaving.

The French cannons buried by the Spainards, who promptly forgot where they were, were found by a ranch hand almost 300 years later.

Rene-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Lasalle looking out on Matagorda Bay where two of his vessels were shipwrecked, sealing his fate.

Fast forward to 1846 and Indianola, Texas is founded on this stretch of Matagorda bay. And until being destroyed by two hurricanes in ten years, was second only to Galveston as a Texas Gulf port. 

That’s right, it is me next to a camel silhouette

We concluded our museum visits in Goose Island with a trip to the Texas Maritime Museum in Rockport and we also enjoyed a delicious seafood dinner at Latitude 28 02 on a very windy night in Rockport.