Dear Ms. Feet,

I've always thought it was cool the way highway 100 - "the road to nowhere" - ends in a big sand dune seven miles north of town. So I tried to drive to the end not too long ago and found my way impeded by --another sand dune stretching completely across the road! What's up with that? Are they going to clear it again?

As a matter of fact, I noticed that big ol' sandpile there myself not too long ago. (As a professional sand sculptor, big piles of sand tend to grab my attention.) For some time now the sand mover guys have been valiantly battling the encroaching dunes and it would appear that the dunes have -- for the moment, any ways -- won and have in fact reclaimed the last mile or so of paved road. (You can of course still drive north directly on the beach by crossing over at Atwood Park.)

We are not talking a dinky little sand drift or two, here. This is a LOT of sand and moving it back off the roadway would involve an engineering feat something along the lines of those required to build Stonehenge, the Hoover Dam or the great pyramids of Egypt.

Of course, the possibility exists that a big storm will come along and put it all back the way it used to be - maybe in our lifetimes, maybe not. At any rate, I am pretty sure that this is just Mother Nature's way of reminding us that we are hanging out on a sand bar -- and not a very stable one at that.

Dear sandy feet,

I spend as much time as I can on South Padre Island, but when I can't be there I like to keep up with what is going on via the world wide web. I used to see your "footprints" all over the site at www.south-padre-island.com but it seems that all traces of you have disappeared from there. Are you still involved in putting SPI on the net?

While it is true that I am no longer affiliated with spi.com, I am still very interested in exposing the Island to the web-surfing world in the best of all possible lights and so am busily telling/showing the world how much fun we are having at a brand new web page located at www.spionline.com.

I spend a fair amount of time roaming the web, and my surfing expeditions led me to the conclusion that there is already a lot of great SPI info available on the net . What was needed was a mega-index site, all categorized , organized and annotated so that someone who is looking for area information would be able to easily locate specific answers to specific questions with a minimum amount of hassle and searching. This site should be interactive, interesting and useful to visitors, locals, and part-time locals. That is the site I have set out to create.

SPIonline is a totally noncommercial (as in, "no one is paying me to do this") site jam-packed with SPI-related links, features, and a digital photo album of people having fun on SPI. Other features include a voting booth, where the site visitor can express his/her feelings on island issues - the current question involves the regulation of outdoor displays for local businesses. (As of this writing, the majority of respondents to this totally unscientific poll seem to be leaning towards keeping outdoor displays legal.) I have posted message boards for Spring Breakers and Winter Texans, free local classifieds and a site-wide search engine to make it extra easy to find just what you are looking for fast.

My newest addition to the site is a fast-growing selection of electronic postcards - photos shot by local photographers right here on spi - that can be sent to anyone in the world via E-mail.

I hope everyone with net access and an interest in South Padre will take a minute to stop by and check out my latest project. Suggestions or corrections are always welcomed, and if you have an SPI-related web page (business or personal) that is not already linked from these pages, please drop me an E-mail or visit my "free for all" links page to get your site listed.