"Let's head for the heron rookery," my husband suggested.

Goose Island Gothic

A foggy morning launched my first tentative outing into the bay surrounding Goose Island State Park. The constant spring winds had eased, leaving the bay calm and the air moist. I turned my kayak into the gray bay and followed my husband's bright yellow sea kayak.

As we paddled, the pipes and platform of an oil well came into view. The fog lightened for us to see ten or twelve adult great blue herons standing on the platform, breeding plumage fringing their necks. Soon, chicks were visible, smaller versions of the adults, with pointed long beaks stuck straight up in the air, their bodies hidden in large stick nests. We paddled quietly around the platform, keeping our distance as the adult birds eyed us warily.

Cruise along brush-covered shorelines, sit instead of wade, slide up shallow channels where no other boat can go. Kayaks take bird-watchers beyond the usual shore-bound birding sites. Drawing only a few inches of water with no motor noise, kayaks provide observers a different and often closer vantage point.

Texas, with its balmy weather and rich avifauna, is a great place to combine kayaking and bird-watching, and Goose Island State Park is an excellent place for novices to slip a boat in the water. Dense oak mottes, seagrass marshes and oyster reefs provide habitat for over 300 species of birds. Located 12 miles north of Rockport off Texas Highway 35, Goose Island State Park is part of the Great Texas Coastal Birding Trail. Adjacent to Aransas National Wildlife Refuge, the park is on Lamar Peninsula, surrounded by Aransas and St. Charles Bays.

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