Texarkana Trip 2026 - Day 5 (Houston)

Day 5 would be spent in the Houston area. We had looked at our planned stops for the day and decided we'd have time to drive a bit south to Galveston, on the water.

But first things first...Donuts!! After multiple recommendations (and seeing them throughout Houston), we stopped at Shipley Do-Nuts and bought a variety of donuts to try. We munched on them throughout the day - definitely a 10 out of 10, 👍.

I was so impressed by the road infrastructure in and around the Houston area. The zig-zag of the interstates as they climb over each other, higher and higher - it was crazy!

The skies were overcast but the weather promised to stay dry, thankfully! We drove out to the State Park and then decided to walk out on one of the piers that we saw when we came in to town. 

After walking out to the end of the pier, we decided to walk along the beach a bit as we headed back to the car. The beach was covered in dried seaweed so we didn't venture to the water. We did find a collection of shells that someone had collected that morning - we grabbed a few of them as souvenirs. 

As we drove back in to Houston, we stopped at a Bucc-ees, Because - Why not!

Back in Houston, first stop was Cloud Column at The Brown Foundation Plaza. This Plaza is located at the Glassell School of Art. The 30 foot sculpture (by Anish Kapoor, artist of Chicago's Cloud Gate) was 1) beautiful,  2) fun and 3) quiet and not busy! We enjoyed walking around it, taking pictures.

While there, we walked around and admired the other artwork on display. I also ran up the steps to take pictures from the top - the view was impressive!

Coming down the stairs, I saw this little guy (we ended up seeing a ton of them throughout the day in the different garden areas that we visited). How does something so cute have the capability of scaring the crud out of you?!?

One last look at the sculpture before heading back inside to the parking garage.

I debated for a brief second...but decided against it. Wet jeans makes for a long afternoon!

Back inside the school and heading to the car. The staircase was impressive.

Heading back to the garage - the elevator was huge (typical for art museums).

On the road again, next stop Water Wall.

This stop wowed us both! I was glad that Matt recorded the fountains because pictures really don't do it justice. I was also thankful that it was pretty quiet while we were there. We were able to take pictures without other groups in the background, which was nice.

I saw a post about Bethel Baptist Church (now a park) and added it to our agenda. The park looked like a unique & peaceful stop that we would enjoy. The church was home to one of Houston's most prominent African American Congregations. It was originally built in 1889 as "a haven for former slaves". It was destroyed by the 1900 Galveston Hurricane, rebuilt/destroyed and rebuilt a 3rd (and final) time. The last service was held in 1997 and then abandoned. There was a fire that gutted the interior of the church in 2005. Four years later, the church was purchased by the city of Houston and a park built within the walls of the gutted church. The city did a wonderful job!

Don't worry - I'm all good! Just taking some pictures from ground level, ha!

We were pleasantly surprised by the ease of which we were able to travel around the city. For being such a large city and visiting stops in the heart of the downtown area, we found it was fairly simple to do. Traffic actually seemed to get worse as we got further away from downtown! 

Some other sites we made quick stops at, or things seen as we were driving around...

We saw the Beatles sculptures a few times but never remembered where they were to have the camera ready. This is a borrowed picture from the world wide web! 

Both of these sculptures were made by David Adickes - we'd see one more of his sculptures when we traveled to Sam Houston's Huntsville.

We found these Smurf hydrants cute!

Houston has painted these ornament balls in celebration of hosting 2026 FIFA World Cup Soccer matches.

We planned to stop at Buffalo Bayou Park to see the different things that the park has to offer. We already knew that we wouldn't be able to be there at night to see the bats flying out from under the Waugh Drive Bridge (which was a disappointment). We did drive by The Dandelion Fountain and stopped for a better look. 

The trees were impressive!

I was pretty excited to find this statue/monument of Barbara Bush (former First Lady) at the Houston Public Library. Her primary initiative was Family Literacy. She is reading a book to her "audience" (who would be sitting on open books) and their dog Millie. 

Our last stop before dinner and hotel was at Pappadeaux, to snap some pictures of Matt with the sign. Since the one that he worked at is now gone, we found a substitute stand in!

Found another little lizard!

We grabbed dinner (Texas Roadhouse...while in Texas, you know!) then headed to our hotel for the night. Matt was thrilled to see Houston again, though he didn't recognize a lot of it (he said he didn't do much exploring while living there). He really enjoyed seeing Seabrook on Day 4. Tomorrow we would be heading out of Houston - we weren't sure what our plans were for Day 6. That would be decided at the hotel after dinner!

Favorites from Day 5:

Matt: Water Wall

Becki: Cloud Column (the whole art plaza)