Beautiful sunset.

Another little alligator hanging out on the shore.

Javalinas in the foreground and white tailed deer in the background.

The ranch does alot of controlled burns and they were just finishing up with this one.

This little guy was having a sun bath on the shore of the lake. I wanted to take a scrub brush to his back......it was all dirty!



There are many of these gates all over the ranch. They are know as "Bump Gates". They were invented by Exxon (the company that has leased the mineral rights on the ranch) so trucks driving around would not have to get out to open gates. You nudge the gate with your bumper and it swings out of the way, lets one vehicle through and then closes.

One of the Sante Gertudes Cows. This is Mr. 604!

This is a ball of Antique barbed wire. This or it's modern version is no longer used on the ranch any longer as it caused too many injuries to the animals. Now they use stainless steel wire fencing with squares and crimps so animals can not hurt themselves.



This is a wagon showing the brand used on all King Ranch livestock and products. Is this a prototype?????



Now.... for those who didn't know, Ford has a Special Addition Truck, known as the King Ranch.....recognize the Brand? It has been named and designed in conjunction with the King Ranch. Any wonder all the vehicles used on the Ranch are Fords.





An interesting tree in front of the Information center.
This building was the carriage house when carriages were used. The buggies and coaches that were stored here are now displayed at the Museum in town.

The Ranch has had 3 family homes all built in roughly the same spot. The original was very small and was replaced by a larger wood structure which burned down except for the kitchen area. This photo shows that kitchen area.




In the foreground is a functioning cannon which was confiscated from the Rio Grand River during the war with Mexico. In the background is a very small portion of the 35,000 Sq. Ft. family home on the Ranch......and yes that is Thirty-Five Thousand Square Feet!! No one actually lives in the house anymore but a staff of 16 are employed to maintain the home. Members of the family still use the house for various functions.

This building is known as the Commissary, a store built by the owner of the ranch. Employees who lived and worked on the ranch could buy anything here that was not grown or available from the Ranch. It was closed in the 80's and now houses offices and the upper floors are guest rooms.

Years ago they held cattle auctions here but now this building is used as a service garage for ranch vehicles.

The ranch keeps one herd of Texas Long Horns and this guy was very good to pose for me.

This was sooo neat! That baby calf had just been born, he was still wet and very wobbly on his new legs. He was very cute! This again is a special breed of cow bred specifically for this ranch. The breed is known as Sante Gertrudis.

This pasture contained only pregnant mares waiting to foal.
These horses are a special breed of horse bred specifically for herding cattle on this ranch. One cowboy needs about 6 horses to do his job.

Some of the peddle cars on display at Harel's drug Store.

It was up at 8:00 to walk the dogs, make a thermos of coffee and then into the truck to head off to the the town of Kingsville. Today we are visiting the "King Ranch" on the Santa Gertrudis Creek. It is a 15,000 acre operating cattle ranch that runs about 47,000 head of cattle. We drove directly to the visitors center to confirm our seats on the 3 1/2 hour nature tour and to also book our historical tour of the Ranch. We were too late for the 10:00 tour so we booked into the 12:00 tour instead. This gave us time to go into town and take in the Museum. The actual exhibits in the museum were not extensive but there was a very good film about the history of the ranch.

After the museum we drove to the drugstore soda fountain for lunch. It was a neat old fashion drug store, with antique little peddle cars on display around the ceiling. the food was not anything special but the atmosphere was neat.

We got back to the visitors center in time to board the bus and do the tour. You have to take into account that all the photos were taken through the windows of the bus, thus the quality is not quite what I would like. You are not allowed to get out of the tour vehicles at anytime anywhere on the Ranch as they have a serious Rattle Snake population.

We had a bit of time to kill between tours but managed to check out the gift shop and surrounding area while we waited.

There were only 6 of us on the Nature tour in a large van. We saw an abundance of birds, ducks, alligators, deer, feral pigs, Javalinas and armadillos. Again all the pictures were taken through the windows. We finished our tour at 6:20 and started on our way home. We stopped in Corpus Christi for dinner.

When we got home the dogs were very happy to see us although we had arranged for someone to take them out during the day.