Harlingen, Texas

Continuing down the Gulf Coast of Texas, our next stop was Harlingen, Texas. Deep in the Rio Grande Valley, Harlingen is home to many snowbirds from many of the northern states. These  "Winter Texans" come spend the warmer climate of the Rio Grande Valley (RGV) and forego the snow and freezing temperatures of the Northeast. We had never visited this area, so this was a first for us. We selected Tropic Winds RV Resort for our stay. Here's some pictures....

Remembering our troops....Keep them safe!

Highway 35 just outside the City of Harlingen, Texas. This drive was interesting as most of the area is barren desert with some crop activity. However, they have planted many palm trees in the median, probably to give the area a more exotic Polynesian flair.

Here's a sample of the area on both sides of the highway.

You can see some of the palm trees in this picture.

This guy never moved, even though Jasmine wanted to play. Notice his eyes are not closed either. His coloring was certainly different.

In Harlingen there is a museum dedicated to the flag raising at Iwo Jima. As part of the museum, they display tanks, howitzers, cannons and other artillery. The red sign says, "Please do not climb on or fire the artillery". Umm, OK!

Posted here and below is the memorial dedicated to the flag raising.

This monument recreates the photograph taken on February 23, 1945 on Mount Suribachi, Japan.

It dipicts 5 US Marines and one Navy corpsman raising the flag.

 

Sadly, three of the marines were killed in the line of duty about three days after the picture was taken. 

As the soldiers raised the flag on Mount Suribachi, Japan, a journalist snapped a photograph of the event and sent it back to the States. It became extremely popular during and after the war. Later, it became the only photograph to win the Pulitzer Prize for Photography in the same year as its publication, and came to be regarded in the United States as one of the most significant and recognizable images of the war, and possibly the most reproduced photograph of all time

In 1954, the image was used to sculpt the Marine Corps War Memorial which is located adjacent to Arlington National Cemetery in Washington D.C. This is the original mold for that sculpture.

There are two museums in the area that we decided to visit. San Benito, Texas has a museum as a tribute to Freddy Fender, a country singer who had several gold records. Los Fresnos, Texas has "Little Graceland", a tribute to the King of Rock and Roll, Elvis Presley.

Unfortunately, they both were closed during our visit. Little Graceland appeared to be simply someone's house dedicated by an over the top fan of Elvis.

Next up....South Padre Island