It's Time to La Posada!
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Inside the Moon Santa Visits Island A2 Enchanted Auction A2 Surfrider Benefit A13 Fishing A18 Issue 660 The Island Free The voiceMoon of The Island since 1996 December 8 2016 Weekly FREE Around The Island By Dale Rankin It's Time to La Posada! The Island is a coiled spring as of this writing, waiting with what passes for anticipation on our little sandbar for Cold Front Christmas (the third of the year) to come busting in over the Laguna and blow the north side of our palm trees flat for a couple of days. But if the Weather Wonks get it right the 42nd version of the La Posada Lighted Boat Parades will go off Friday and Saturday under cloudy skies with ten mile per hour winds, moderate temperatures and less than a ten percent chance of rain. That passes for Chamber of Commerce Weather this time of year. By Friday Island weather should regress to the Island Weather Mean and by Saturday the wind will lay down and temperatures will fluctuate between 50 and 70 degrees. That sounds about like last year with maybe a bit less wind. The number of boats in the Saturday Hats off at La Posada Kick-off The Origin of the Lighted Boat parade, traditionally the larger of the By Brent Rourk go to the United States Marine’s Toys two, has been down the last few years Where else but our Island can you for Tots program. Within a couple of Parade as more people have opted for deck find such a large group of generous weeks, Marines will dispense toys to Editor’s Note: The 42nd version of By Mary Spolans parties rather than making the rounds people dedicated to giving and hundreds of children in the Coastal the La Posada Lighted Boat Parade Way back in the foggy ruins of in lighted boats. When the weather making Christmas a little brighter Bend. will take to Island canals Friday and history in the 1970s the stars were threatens it’s much safer to stick for others? Judging from last night’s Saturday nights, December 9-10. For The Kick-Off Party was marked by out on a windless night when a group close to the fireplace and the bar than success at the La Posada Kick-Off a complete rundown of events and an enthusiastic crowd, fine food and of friends including Bob and Cherie venture out on the water. But alas, it Party many less fortunate children parade routes see the information in drink, terrific music, and an efficient Holiday were gathered at Jack and is a boat parade we are after so get out in the Coastal Bend will have a nicer this issue. group of volunteers from the La Marian Lavers house on Dorsal. Nan there and light it up if you can. Christmas. Posada Committee and the Padre But how did the parade begin? and John Paramore came cruising Aquarius Dragway The La Posada Foundation’s annual Island Yacht Club. The Scuttlebutts What was the origin of this Island by on their 32-foot boat lit up with La Posada Kick-Off Party raised crew as usual helped make the tradition? For an answer we went Christmas spirit with lights on the It has been but a few years since the over $14,000 on Tuesday evening evening a huge success. to longtime Islander Mary Spolans. opening of the Aquarius Extension Origins cont. on A4 at Scuttlebutts through silent and La Posada Foundation President Here is her story. made the final connection between live auctions. Dozens of local Commodores and Whitecap as Doug Seefeldt commented, “What a businesses donated incredible gift great and night we had at the La imagined by the original Island items including BBQs, massages, Tortuga Dunes Plans planners. They elected to make a Kick-off cont. on A4 gift baskets, vacations, art items, and By Dale Rankin “Right now our plan is to keep it as tradeoff that we are now paying more. Proceeds from the auctions will for. They had the choice of either As the likely new owner of the long Planned Use Development (PUD),” including sidewalks in their plans stalled Tortuga Dunes development Lampkin said, “which would include or adding more park land and they Island Chef's Con-Quest bordering Zahn Road and the Gulf retail space along Zahn Road, single- chose the latter. The tradeoff for not Beach north of Packery Channel building sidewalks was additional Developer Jeff Lamkin says he could park land to be maintained by the city. have the mixed-use residential and The original designers also retail site up and running as early as incorporated three thoroughfares Summer 2017. running north to south with Aquarius being one. Then the decision was “It just depends on how things work made to eliminate an Aquarius bridge out,” Lamkin said at the Tortuga that left a bifurcated road with the final Dunes office last week. “If everything piece of the puzzle being the Aquarius falls into place we could have at least Extension. The result of all that is part of the development up and going that Aquarius from Commodores to by this summer, or it could be the Whitecap has become a main Island summer of 2018. We won’t know for traffic artery without sidewalks. certain until we take possession of the At the Island Strategic Action property. Committee meeting Tuesday night a Lamkin said he has the 137-acre lady who owns a home on Aquarius tract under contract from the previous said drivers have been passing stopped owners, the Forestar Group, and if school buses on the right-hand side things move as expected he will take Jeff Lamkin and high-speed traffic has become a full possession of the property by the daily problem as walking lanes are end of 2016. About 70 acres of the separated from traffic by nothing but site was deeded over to the Mollie family residence along the dunes, a white line on the roadway. So far Beattie Coastal Habitat Community and retail space behind the dunes on the only casualty has been a dog but by the previous owner to be preserved the Gulf Beach in the center of the as things now stand the interaction in perpetuity as wetlands. The property.” between vehicles and carbon units is remainder of the site, an L-shaped Development at the site stalled headed for trouble. It’s an issue that is Island Moon Columnist Wins on Food Network! tract of about 66 acres, runs from in 2010 when the cost of flood only going to become more profound Island Moon food columnist and owner of A La Mode gelateria Chef State Highway 361, along the north insurance soared to an estimated and will not solve itself. Vita Jarrin went national last week when she competed on the Cooks side of Zahn Road, then parallel to $5000 per month due to the property Then there’s this vs. Cons show on the Food Network and beat three other contestants and including the dune line along the being located in a Coastal Barrier by cooking her lasagna and making bread pudding out of donuts. Gulf Beach, a possible location for a Resources Act (COBRA) zone which As we all know we live on an Island Way to go Vita! beach bar/restaurant operation. Tortuga cont. on A4 that is smack dab in the middle of active smuggling lanes between the producers of illicit products south of A little Island History the Rio Bravo and consumers of same said products north of it. We hear Padre Island in the Year 1766 stores but generally don’t address Although Spaniards had visited the Malaquittas Island, commonly Carrying out the above them in these pages; it is what it is. Padre Island before 1766, Diego Ortíz known as Isla Blanca. mentioned orders, A few weeks ago we reported that a Parrilla's inspection of The Island in we the ensigns Don Decree: Real de Santa Petronila, bundle of those products washed up that year was one of the first detailed Joseph Antonio de la September twenty two of the year one on the beach at the Michael J. Ellis reconnaissances. His report is one Garza, Don Eugenio thousand seven hundred and sixty six. Seawall and was duly turned over of the first accounts, if not the first, Fernández, and the Patro The ensigns Don Joseph Antonio de to police. But as the story goes, and of The Island that has survived. A Matheo Martínez certify, la Garza and Don Eugenio Fernández confirmed by those hired to catch the transcript of the document is located and if necessary swear, and the Padro Matheo Martínez smugglers, there was more than one in the University of Texas Archives that having departed certify as follows everything bundle that found its way to local among the Dunn Transcripts. Mr. the thirteenth of this performed and observed from the beaches but didn’t end up in the Ricardo Torres-Reyes of the Office month to reconnoiter thirteenth of the present month hands of law enforcement. Put it this of History and Historic Architecture, the Island of San Carlos when they began the reconnaissance way, if your friend who for years has National Park Service, provided the de los Malaquittas, with of the Island of San Carlos of the struggled to pay his mortgage drives following translation. twenty four soldiers and up next week in a new Bentley he Malaquittas until last night when nine Indians from the may have been the person who found Year of 1767 they arrived in this camp, carrying Don Diego Ortíz Parrill missions of Rio Grande, one of the bundles on the beach.