Padre Island National Seashore

Padre Island National Seashore

Padre Island National Seashore (PAIS) is a National Seashore located on Padre Island off the coast of South Texas. In contrast to South Padre Island (well known for its beaches and vacationing college students), PAIS is located on North Padre Island and consists of a long beach where nature is preserved. Primitive camping is available there and most of the beach is only accessible to four wheel drive vehicles.

North Padre Island is the longest undeveloped barrier island in the world. The National Seashore is 70 miles (110 km) long with 65.5 miles (105.4 km) of Gulf beach. The Park hosts a variety of pristine beach, dune, and tidal flat environments, including the Laguna Madre on its west coast, a famous spot for windsurfing. It is located in parts of Kleberg, Kenedy, and Willacy counties, with Kenedy County having the majority of its land area.

Read more about Padre Island National Seashore:  Kemp's Ridley Sea Turtles, Birdwatching, Shoreline Trash, Oil and Natural Gas Drilling

Famous quotes containing the words island, national and/or seashore:

    “The shifting islands! who would not be willing that his house should be undermined by such a foe! The inhabitant of an island can tell what currents formed the land which he cultivates; and his earth is still being created or destroyed. There before his door, perchance, still empties the stream which brought down the material of his farm ages before, and is still bringing it down or washing it away,—the graceful, gentle robber!”
    —Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)

    “We want, and must have, a national policy, as to slavery, which deals with it as being wrong.”
    —Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865)

    “The seashore is a sort of neutral ground, a most advantageous point from which to contemplate this world. It is even a trivial place. The waves forever rolling to the land are too far-traveled and untamable to be familiar. Creeping along the endless beach amid the sun-squall and the foam, it occurs to us that we, too, are the product of sea-slime.”
    —Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)