South Padre Island, TX

Second visit: May 27-31, 2011

We stayed at the Holiday Inn Express, which is 3 or 4 miles north of the center of the island. Having been here 6 years prior, I had an idea of the DX possibilities. What I wasn't sure about is if being here two months later when it was noticeably warmer made any difference. Well, it seems as if it did. I didn't attempt any digital TV DX, and while I checked FM while driving around (best logging was WXBM-102.7 Milton, FL) my main attention was on NOAA Weather Radio. I ended up getting my furthest ever NWR tropo logging from any location by a couple hundred miles! The full log appears below. As before, I was using my ICOM R-10 scanner. We were on the 4th floor at the end of the building facing northeast.

NWR Log

First visit: March 21-24, 2005

We spent three nights at the La Quinta Inn on South Padre Island (SPI), situated about 4 miles north of the causeway (TX 100) from Port Isabel. This appeared to be the furthest north hotel on SPI. We were in room 207, facing northeast with a partial view of the shore (see below photo, taken from the balcony).

For DX equipment, I had a very simple setup. I used my WinTV-USB with rabbit ears connected to my Dell laptop PC. I used my ICOM R-10 handheld scanner for weather radio DX. Reception was much better on the balcony so I took the equipment outside for almost all the loggings. Fortunately the direction we faced was right towards the best signals!

The afternoon and evening of the 22nd featured the best conditions. The morning of the 24th when we left was good also, but featured more inland signals than the coastal DX from the 22nd. Overall it was a great time; I had forgotten how much fun Gulf DX could be! Even more interesting, I logged more NWR signals (21) in three days than I did in over 2 years in Tallahassee, FL! Granted there were fewer stations on air in the early 1990s, but it was still impressive.

TV DX Log

TV DX Photos

WMAH-19, Biloxi, MS (592 mi)	WXXV-25, Gulfport, MS (586 mi)
WGNO-26, New Orleans, LA (514 mi)	WNOL-38, New Orleans, LA (514 mi)
KADN-15, Lafayette, LA (419 mi)	KLTL-18, Lake Charles, LA (388 mi)
KAKW-62, Killeen, TX (320 mi)	KTBE-55, Conroe, TX (309 mi)
KPXB-49, Conroe, TX (308 mi)	KXAN-36, Austin, TX (291 mi)
KEYE-42, Austin, TX (291 mi)	KHWB-39, Houston, TX (258 mi)

NWR Log