El Copano

  For over two decades now, I have been fascinated with the history of a town that sits on the northwest shoreline of Copano, known as EL Copano.

  El Copano first rose to prominent existence in the mid-1700s, but I have seen some documentation showing early Spanish explorers showing up around that area as early as the late 1500s. Starting out as a lair for pirates and smugglers, El Copna turned into a sizeable early settlement along the central Texas coast, as well as a bustling trade port where goods were offloaded and transported to other towns, one of which ultimately grew into San Antonio.

El Copano began to decline in the mid-1800s, and for the past 150 years has been a ghost town, with only a few structures left that are being swallowed up by the eroding northwest shoreline of Copano Bay.
I first became interested in the history of El Copano around 1999, and have read many books on the subject. Unfortunately what remains of the town is on a large private ranch, and can only be seen by boat. I aactually  tried to reach El Copano back in 2004 by beaching my boat at the mouth of Mission Bay, and wading a mile and a half up the shoreline to view the remaining structures. This unfortunately was not a viable plan, as that is the rough side of the bay, and there was simply too much deep and rough water to wade through to get to the location.

Over the years I had resolved myself to the fact that I may never get to see those ruins in person. They are quickly being swallowed up by an ever-eroding shoreline, and one has to have a boat much bigger than mine to access the ruins from the bay side.

All that changed last week, when Jack and I made a day run down to Mission Bay. As luck would have it, the wind was less than 5kts the whole morning, so we made the decision to run out into Copano and see if we could make it up to the old townsite. As we exited the mouth of Mission Bay, there were at least 25-30 porpoises schooling in the deeper water, chasing schools of mullet, It's very common to see these graceful creatures, but I don't know that I had ever witnessed a school that large.

  The water was like glass, so we ran up the shoreline, and after 25 years, I finally got to see the old town of Copano...or at least what is left of it. Only a few structures remain, the most visible of which is the old customs house. We both marveled at how well some of this architecture had survived the harsh daily environment and vicious seasonal hurricanes over the last 250 years.

  After multiple pictures and videos were taken, we decided to make our way back to the boat ramp to explore another area I used to frequent as a young man. During the boat ride back, I witnessed one of the most amazing things I have ever seen. Copano Bay is normally a bit off-color, but this particular day it was clear and emerald green. At one point Jack looked down over the side of the boat, and there was a GIANT porpoise about 8 feet long and weighing many hundreds of pounds, literally two feet from the side of the boat and only about 6 inches under the surface. I guess he became curious and decided he wanted to race my little aluminum skiff. For 100 meters or more, he matched us doing 20-25 mph, and would pump his tail every time I would accelerate the engine! It was an amazing sight to see an animal that large, in its own environment, interacting with us in such a personal way.
Jack and I were both speechless and agreed this was one of those moments that will be burned in both of our memories forever.

  Although the fishing wasn't that great (due to the tidal surge from Hurricane Milton over in Florida), we did manage to check off a few boxes for things we had been planning to do for many years. And the porpoise race was icing on the cake!

Hope you all are having a great week!

Andy