A Surfing Destination Just an Hour Away From H-Town?

Hey everyone, it's Raheel. What if I told you that pristine beaches with incredible surfing, fishing, birding, and crabbing existed just an hour away from Houston without that crazy I-45 Galveston traffic? Would you believe me? Well, welcome to Surfside Beach. Joining me today is Michelle Booth from the village of Surfside Beach to answer the age of the old question, why is in Surfside Beach as popular as Galveston? It's Wednesday, May 3rd. I'm Raheel Romsen-Ollie, and here's what Houston is talking about. Michelle, welcome in to Citycast Houston. So excited to talk to you about Surfside Beach, but before we jump into that, what's your favorite activity to do in Surfside? Definitely walking the beach and searching for seashells and other treasures. So there's a lot of seashells there. I didn't know this, but what, over 400 species, right? There are, and you can typically find those in colder weather, but you can find shells year round. That is awesome. All right, I talked about it in the intro. There's so many things to do at Surfside Beach, and it's only an hour away, but for some reason, it's not as popular as Galveston. Why is that? It is probably because we are a very laid-back village. We're not the party town. We are very family-friendly, and we don't have the boardwalks and the ferris wheels, but we have a lot of great other activities here. You can surf, you can go fishing, you can go boating, or you can just enjoy the four miles of beach that we have. We're small, but we're a lot of fun. That is so cool. So this surfing. Look, it's Surfside Beach. It's named after surfing. Explain this to me because I've gone to Galveston a lot. Like many people in the city of Houston, and maybe once a blue moon, you can catch a wave. You can maybe ride it for like three seconds, but there's legit surfing at Surfside, right? Yes, absolutely. It's amazing that surfers are constantly watching. We have cameras along beach drive here, and surfers are constantly watching for those waves. On any given day, you can see hundreds of surfers in the water. The jetty that we have built here actually helps to create waves. And so on any, not really a stormy day, but any windy day, or when that south wind is coming in, it's going to create a lot of great waves for the surfers. So Houstonians can literally drive up to the beach, all right? A rental surfboard, and try to catch a wave. Absolutely. That is nuts to me, right? Because as a surfer, you got to go to Cabo, California, maybe another town to catch those waves, but right here we can catch legit waves. Not only that, but we have people here who teach surfing. So you can actually go to surfing school here in Surfside and learn how to do it. Wow. Okay, sign me up. I am all in on that. You also, the other great thing about Surfside Beecher, other water activities there as well, kayaking is huge. What other activities can we do? Well, when the surf is not ideal for surfing, you can paddle board. You can just paddle out. You can kayak out. If that's what you prefer, a little bit less strenuous activity for you. There's a lot of fishing. There's a lot of boating going on. And you don't have to just fish from a boat. You can fish from the shore. You can fish from our jetty, which is a mile long. You can fish at the crabbing pier. You can go crabbing at the crabbing pier if that's something you prefer. There's a lot to do just as far as fishing is concerned. Nice. So you can get all of that in. So the fishing, can you rent equipment down there at the beach? You got to bring your own equipment. Do you have to have a license as well? You do have to have a fishing license. Those last a year. You can also purchase one here at our local stores, or you can grab one from Academy on your way in when you're coming into town. But as far as the fishing is concerned, you do have to have your own equipment if you're going to do it from the shore or the jetty. But if you rent a charter boat and want to go deep sea fishing, which we have probably a dozen companies that do that, they will provide you all the fishing gear. So you and your buddies can go out together, catch the big fish, and then come back in with dinner. I smell city cast Houston. Dater. Okay. That's what I'm talking about. Exactly. Tell me. I was looking up stuff about or when I was looking up things to do at Surfside Beach, Surfside was recently given bird city status from Texas Parks and Wildlife. What is that about? So we are a bird destination. We have over 400 species of birds here in Brazoria County. And on any given day, you can find a rare bird flying into Surfside. Everybody loves Surfside. So we, there's seven cities in the state of Texas, by the Texas Parks and Wildlife, who were designated bird city. And we had to do quite a bit of paperwork and, you know, grant work to get this designation. But it's an honor. I mean, it's an honor that's one of seven. We're the smallest. We're given that honor. You know, the big cities have it. Houston has it. Austin has it. But our little Surfside is also designated a bird city. So that is significant to birders all over the country who want to come and see the 400 different species of birds that we have here. That's really cool. I didn't know there was a big process to get that. I thought it was just like somebody comes up there and they're like, okay, we spotted 50 species and hey, you made the cut now because 50 is the cut off line. I didn't know there was paperwork. There's a lot of work to, and you have to keep it up. There's things you have to do. We can't just plant certain plants. We have to have native plants for the birds. We have to have a water source for the birds. During migration, the birds are crossing the Gulf of Mexico. So you want to attract them and the way to do that is to have a fresh water source, a fresh food source and a fresh habitat. And we have that with our bird and butterfly trail here in Surfside. That is so cool. So where's the best place to watch all the birds and go birding in Surfside? Four 18 Parkview is the address. It's at the intersection of Parkview and Monument Drive. And that is our bird and butterfly trail. It's only two and a half miles long. It's not very big. But you can sit on a bench in that trail and see dozens of species of birds. I mean, the colorful, beautiful birds that you wouldn't expect to see anywhere else in Texas. Wow, that is so cool. I'm definitely going to bring my daughter and do that because she loves colorful birds. And that is the place to do it if you've got a bird city right there. Wonderful. And bring your camera. You want to take pictures? Absolutely. All right. So one of the cool things about Surfside Beach that I love is you can park your car right on the beach. I like Galveston and you can park on the seawall boulevard and walk down. And that's fine. But I mainly go to Bollywood because of that feature where I just want to pull up to the beach, put up my tent and I'm good to go. Has that is that one of the big draws there for Surfside just parking on the beach? Absolutely. So there's two options. You can park in our free parking lot and not pay for a beach permit and walk on with your, you know, your towels and your bathing suit. Or you can drive directly on. It's a $12 beach permit for the whole year that lasts you for the whole year. And that gives you the privilege, I guess, to park on the beach, to set up your tent, to grill your food, have, you know, whatever you're going to do. And that is a really nice option because then you don't have to carry everything along distance. Yeah, that is such a good option. Now one of the drawbacks to that though, has that been an issue on the environment at all because of all the cars and look, the oil spills a little bit, has that been an issue at all? The cars, not necessarily, we do have an issue with littering, which we really are trying hard, working hard to, you know, stop that. But all we ask is whatever you bring in, please take out with you. Just like a park, a national park that you would go to, we want to keep the beach nice for everyone in the state of Texas. So we ask that if you bring it in, take it out. Take it out with you. That's perfect. Like that's the least you could do, right? Sure, absolutely. All right, so what are some of the best tips you have for our listeners that are heading the surfside beach for the first time? I would say that definitely pack everything you need for the day. That way you don't have to go back over the bridge to go and purchase food or drinks or whatever, bring everything you need. A canopy is, in my opinion, a must, some sort of shade for yourself and your family. And just enjoy it, have a lot of fun, stay the whole day. We just ask that you only leave your footprints behind. That is so cool. What is your perfect day on surfside? Like you say, if you could plan out a day for our listeners, how would you plan it? Gosh, like I said, walking the beach is one of my favorite things to do. I do it every single day without fail, whether it's 19 degrees or 91 degrees, I'm on the beach. Wow. I love it so much. My perfect day is literally just sitting in a chair watching the pelicans go by. They are my favorite. And just to see the lines of pelicans go by is just so relaxing and fun, especially if you've been in the traffic of Houston and you need a break, it's just a great wind down to come here and enjoy that stress free day. All right, one of the best things about heading to the beach is eating. All right, what are your favorite restaurants? What do you recommend for us? Honestly, they're all great. They really are. We have seafood, we have great burgers, we even have pizza. Just they're all really, really great. We have a couple of places, seahorse grill right on the water, right on the beach. We have beachfront restaurant also right on the beach. Sharky's bar and grill, it's a little bit more casual, but they have a great view of the water and then Dorados on the other side on the canal side, you can watch the big barge ships go by while you enjoy your meal and your cocktail. So that's pretty cool too. Yeah, that's really neat. That's really neat. All right, for people that don't want to do the beach activities, we've talked about maybe you can go birding, what other things can they do if they don't want to go on to the beach? Well, if you're not a beach person, definitely the bird and butterfly trail might be your enjoyment. You can certainly go into town into Lake Jackson, which is just 10 minutes away and they actually have a couple of things you can do there. They have a sea center, which is free for all the public and in there you can learn about the different sea creatures. They have a little touch tank for the children. So you can go, it's almost like a little aquarium and that's, yeah, that's really fun to do is if you don't want to get on the sand and you don't want to get on the beach, that's probably your next best enjoyment. All right. All right, I like that. That's a good day right there. If you don't want to be on the beach, one last thing I have to ask you about. All right. Sure. What is this surfing Santa thing I see on my Instagram page, Papa? What is that about? About six years ago, I saw an ad for Santa's who surf right before Christmas and I thought, well, why aren't we doing that? That sounds like a blast. So I talked to some of the local surfers and I said, what do you think? And they said, we're in definitely. And the thing about surfers is they don't care if there's a hurricane or a snowstorm. If there's good waves, they're going to get out there. So they all dress like Santa Claus or Mrs. Claus and they get on their surfboards and they paddle out for a couple of hours just to the enjoyment of kids and grown kids. They come out and just have a great time. And it's a, it's one of my favorite events. It's a lot of fun. That is so cool. The surfing Santa's at Surfside Beach. It's one of the, it's one of my favorite things to see on Instagram just rolling in on my feet. So I appreciate y'all do that. That was a lot of fun. Surfside Beach, everyone needs to check it out. Michelle, thank you so much for coming on and letting our listeners know some tips and what to do. That was a lot of fun. Great. And the best place to check out all the events, all the activities is visit surfsidebeachtx.org. I love it. Thank you, Michelle. Thank you so much. That was Michelle Booth, a tourism specialist from the village of Surfside Beach. You can find more information about everything to do in Surfside with a link in our show notes. Before we go, we're once again a top city in the nation, but this time for being forgetful. Houstonians left a lot of things behind in Ubers in 2022 because we came in as the fourth most forgetful city on Ubers annual lost and found report. Now, of course, items like phones, backpacks, watches, and wallets were the most common items left behind in Ubers, but the most unique thing that caught my eye was that somebody left a bottle of lotion and chicken wings in their Uber. Yes, you heard me right, chicken wings and lotion. Now we'll do it for today. Don't forget to share this episode with your friends and family to help us grow the show. Thank you for listening. I'm Raheel Ramsali and I hope you learned something new. That was Michelle Booth from the village of Surfside Beach. Okay. . .