Hitting 'The Spot'

As mentioned in the first column in this series, my experiences on Galveston Island had been almost completely confined to the East End and the Seawall Boulevard area. The West End, where the moneyed vacationers, families and summer residents gathered, was terra incognita. With the myopia that comes from close proximity, like New Yorkers who never visit Lady Liberty, I'd never struck out west to explore.

On a misty, gloomy, depressing December day, that changed. At the behest of my mother-in-law, we loaded the whole family into her Jeep and my rented SUV and headed down State Hwy. 288 to the coastal town of Freeport. There, we picked up the Bluewater Highway, a two-lane coast road that rarely lost sight of the surf all the way to Galveston, about a 30-mile trek.

Years go, Texas 87 was the analog to the Bluewater Highway on the other side of Galveston Bay, starting in Bolivar and running on through the coast towns of Gilchrist and Crystal Beach on beyond High Island. Over the years, hurricanes and tropical storms damaged the road to the extent that, sometime in the early '80s or so, the state of Texas officially abandoned the road beyond High Island. Giant chunks of the roadbed were simply gone, leaving gaping holes, and almost all traces of human habitation were erased. Hardy adventurers still struck out along the old road, in search of unspoiled, unpopulated beach and the lack of supervision that implied.

Bluewater Highway, in the aftermath of Ike, brought to mind the storm-ravaged doomscape of old 87. A large orange "Travel At Your Own Risk" sign warned of what was to come: a winding path, sometimes on the road, sometimes on the beach, sometimes a little of both, with mysteriously deep pools of water and tire-chewing shell piles.

When I lifted my eyes from the roadbed, it didn't get much better. Every single structure, whether on stilts or flat on the ground, showed signs of Ike's wrath. If a house still sat on its stilts, it was knocked askew by as much as 30 degrees. Most leaned inland, although some obviously had been caught by crosscurrents and heeled in various directions. Occasionally, a set of bare pilings stabbed the mist, ready to hold up a house that was now among the gigantic piles of rubble along the road.

Credit is due to the Texas Dept. of Highways for a near-heroic job at making the road even marginally navigable. Hundreds of truckloads of sand and gravel had obviously been brought in to fill some of the worst craters, and even when the road took to the open beach there were rudimentary lane markers.

Eventually, our little caravan reached the toll bridge to Galveston Island, and discovered the tollbooth deserted, half its windows broken and windblown sand collecting inside. We drove on, and for the first time I laid eyes on the West End.

As much damage as Ike had done along the Bluewater Highway, it had obviously saved its roundhouse punch for the island. Debris was piled everywhere, and even the huge condo towers had a somewhat battered, deserted look about them. I saw a do-it-yourself car wash, the awning miraculously intact but three of the four vacuums ripped from their foundations. There was a lovely, sweeping stone staircase that led up to a front door with no house behind it. There was a house that looked intact, but was rendered inaccessible by the storm surge-cut channel between it and the main road.

Still, signs of life were everywhere. We passed a huge encampment of trailers, RVs, vans and tents bearing the logos of various construction companies. Restaurants were serving, one with a piece of plywood for a front door, and I saw more than one resident working resolutely to pile detritus and make basic repairs. The West End was not at its best, but neither was it out of the fight.

Our destination on this trip was actually back on familiar turf, not far from Gaido's. At mum-in-law's request, we were bound for The Spot, a tiki hut-looking place I'd always dismissed out of hand as a complete tourist trap. It had the neon, loud decor and kitschy ambience that usually marks the sort of place you won't find locals hanging out. However, the boss lady had spent a lot of time doing business on the island, and spoke highly of The Spot's cuisine.

I've rarely been more happy to be completely, utterly and without a doubt wrong in my entire life. At least half the folks waiting in line to order at the counter were obviously BOI (Born On the Island), and the beer offerings alone put the place a cut above. I was amused by the burgers, including the Zachburger with cheddar, Fritos and chili, and decided a burger was just what I needed. I settled on the Ralphburger, topped with cheddar, bacon, barbecue sauce and pickles. I picked an order of fried pickles as an appetizer, as I'm constitutionally incapable of refusing foods that, to a levelheaded cook, simply shouldn't be deep-fried.

The fried pickles were quite simply perfect. Too often, the breading is either too heavy or too wimpy, resulting in either pickle-flavored bread or greasy, limp bits of ecch. These hit the middle mark perfectly, and the pickles were actually decent quality on their own. My 4-year-old, who is at the stage where he's deeply suspicious of new foods, devoured almost as many of them as I did.

Then the burger arrived, and what a work of art it was. A bakery-fresh toasted bun, a top-notch burger grilled to perfection complete with a seared crust, bacon that I'd love to have on hand for my weekend breakfast and cheddar with some actual bite to it. I've eaten enough burgers to sink a medium-sized cargo ship, and this was one of the best of them.

Sitting in the enclosed dining room (it was a bit chilly for dining al fresco on the deck), watching the surf beyond the seawall and listening to the soothing susurration of my fellow diners' voices, I had one of those moments of serenity so rare in the lives of the parents of young children. And, true to form, the moment ended just as quickly as it began, when my younger son got his 14-month-old mitts on a ketchup squeeze bottle and attempted to redecorate his older brother.

The Spot and Gaido's are just blocks from each other, but at the opposite ends of the dining style spectrum. The white linen tablecloths of Gaido's wouldn't work for The Spot, and The Spot's multiple sports-tuned TVs would ruin Gaido's staid atmosphere. But what they share is far more vital: Both are icons of Galveston culture, and no hurricane can chase them into hiding. They aren't chain joints (although The Spot has a bit of neon), and their followers and regulars are nearly religious in their devotion.

Long may they live.

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