Surfside Island Mon

Take a beach cat ride out to into the Gulf.  There are six distinct pods of Dolphins that reside in the waters surrounding Surfside.  These fun and playful marine mammals love to ride in the wake of a sail boat. They will swim so close to the sailboat that you can almost reach out and touch them.  Watch them race you back to shore.  You will realize what truly amazing and beautiful creatures they are.

Admit it, you always wanted to learn how to surf.  Well, the waves at Surfside are some of the best on the Texas coast.  There are surf-able waves 200 days a year, and most of the time the waves are perfect size and form for learning.  Not quite ready to Surf, try a boogie board.  In one afternoon, you'll be catching waves.

Take a bike ride to the marshland on Surfside's Intracoastal shoreline and spot one of these rare roseate spoonbills.  Roseate spoonbills capture the pink glow of sunrise in their wings in flight. Those same rosy feathers proved a near death sentence when demand for feather hats decimated spoonbills, great egrets and other fine-feathered fowl until plume hunting ended before World War I.

Surfside's Intracoastal Shoreline is the southern boundary of the Brazoria National Wildlife Refuse.  The Brazoria National Wildlife Refuge is the key location on the Texas Gulf Coast which drew one the highest Audubon Christmas bird counts in the nation - more than 200 species.  In winter, more than 100,000 snow geese, Canada geese, pintail, northern shoveler, teal, gadwall, American wigeon and mottled ducks fill the plentiful ponds and sloughs to capacity. Sandhill cranes join in too.

In summer, birds that nest on the refuge include ten species of herons and egrets, white ibis, roseate spoonbill, mottled duck, white-tailed kite, clapper rail, horned lark, seaside sparrow, black skimmer, and scissor-tailed flycatcher.

Known as the Cradle of Texas, Surfside is the home of the famous Fort Velasco. The actual Fort was located near the current City Hall.  It was at this port that Stephen F Austin and his colonists first arrived in Texas in 1821.  Eleven years later, in 1832. The first battle of Texas’ war for independence was fought here.  Historical Markers state:

Here was fought a battle-- the first collision in arms between Texas colonists and the Mexican military-- a conflict preliminary to the Texas War for Independence. On June 26, 1832, when Texans under John Austin and Henry Smith came down river with cannon for use against Mexican forces at Anahuac, they ran against the resistance of Lt. Col. Domingo de Ugartechea. As commander of Mexican forces at Velasco, Ugartechea refused passage through the mouth of the Brazos River to the vessel bearing the cannon to Anahuac. Some 112 Texans attacked the port at midnight, and after 9 hours under the fire of Texas rifles and cannon, the Mexican garrison was forced to surrender. The Battle of Velasco, brought on by a customs quarrel at Anahuac, was unknowingly fought after the dispute at Anahuac had been peaceably settled. After the victory at San Jacinto 4 years later, President David G. Burnet moved the capital of the Republic of Texas temporarily to Velasco. Here the Treaty of Velasco, ending hostilities between Texas and Mexico, was signed on May 14, 1836.  

"Shell Shocked" is what you will be after discovering the 600 known shell species found among our 27 miles of sandy beaches of Brazoria County. Surfside Beach is one of the few of the Shell Hunting hot spots in the area. You will be astonished at the scads of sea shells speckling Brazosport beaches.

While your at it don't forget to go crabbing on a summer evening. 

The Gulf provides some of the most breathtaking sunrises and sunsets, with brilliant colors that seem to change with the Gulf's mood.  Not ready to get up that early, how about watching the moon rise over the gulf.  Nothing is quite as spectacular as a blue moon rise over the Gulf.....

Take a golf cart ride along the beach down to Kitty's Purple Cow and enjoy old fashion hamburgers in the Region.  While you're at it say hello to Miss Kitty, a Surfside icon who has been serving up hamburgers since 1983.