What a great weekend! The Galveston Historic Home Tour...

The weather this past weekend was wonderful.  In my wildest dreams I never thought I would be wearing a light weight jacket in May.  That just doesn't happen here.

I headed down to Galveston on Saturday for the Historic Home Tour.  I've probably gone on at least 15 of these tours over the years.  It's usually hot and humid.  Jim and I used to hope for rain because then it would still be hot but the sun would be blocked and conditions would be a little more bearable.  Never did we have a cool day, but this year things were different.

The tour runs for two weekends.  I had originally planned to go this past Saturday and next Saturday, but with the cooler weather I changed my plans and went Saturday and Sunday.  I have a feeling it will be hot and miserable this coming weekend and I wanted to take advantage of the great weather.

It was perfect weather for standing in line although it did warm up a little in the afternoon.

There were big houses and little houses.  This one was huge.  It was built in 1889-1890 and is called Open Gates.  It's owned by The University of Texas Medical Branch and now used as a conference center.  I kind of liked the flower pot up there.

This little cottage was built in 1888 and I believe they said it was 835 square feet.  Isn't it cute?

There were 10 homes on the tour and one was a restoration in progress. The restorations in progress are actually my favorites.  Usually they'll have the finished home on the tour again within a few years.  I took loads of pictures of this year's restoration, but I'll save them for another post.  That's the only home where you can take pictures of the interior.

There were some pretty yards.  Very tropical looking.

 I also took some time to walk along The Strand.  I love the old stores and it was a perfect day for a stroll.

The Carnival Magic was in port.  Hope they'll all have an uneventful cruise!

Look at this pretty street.

I'd love to live in Galveston, but then I remember Hurricane Ike and what the city was like for a long time afterwards.  (Most of the homes on this year's tour flooded during Ike.)  I wrote about our trip down to Galveston four months after the storm here.  I must admit that the city has come back which I thought would probably never happen when I wrote that post back in early 2009.  However, if I was living in Galveston I'd be a nervous wreck every time there was something brewing in the Gulf.  When you live on the Island you have to evacuate!  I don't want to live any closer to the coast than I am right now.  I'll just get my Galveston fix with short day trips.