he Flagship Hotel in Galveston, Texas,
is a can't-miss landmark along Seawall Boulevard: It's on the ocean
side of the street, built 40 years ago on a pier that stretches
1,000 feet into the Gulf of Mexico. But the boxy construction is
looking a little weather-beaten these days and is not long for the
world.
The future of the pier, however, appears bright, emblematic of
the transformation of this forgotten Gulf Coast town into a
thriving cruise port. Houston-based Landry's Restaurants recently
purchased the property and plans to gut the hotel to its steel
frame and rebuild a "Flagship Pleasure Pier," complete with roller
coaster, Ferris wheel and a hotel with Victorian-era touches.
Landry's is not stopping there. It purchased a Holiday Inn in
March and plans to add 90 rooms to its Hilton Galveston Island
property by next spring.
And to aggressively pursue cruise-related business, it will hire
a sales director to handle that surging market.
In Galveston, cruising is the big story, and the numbers tell
the tale: Three years after the port persuaded Carnival Cruise
Lines to bring the Holiday here, about 365,000 cruisers will sail
in and out of Galveston in 2004, according to Carnival figures,
surpassing visits by the seven largest U.S. cruise lines in Tampa,
Fla.; New Orleans; and New York.
Royal Caribbean's Splendour of the Seas arrived two weeks ago;
the Grand Princess, one of the world's largest cruise ships, will
be based here next winter.
In Texas parlance, Carnival is the Spindletop of Galveston
cruising, a rig that gushed forth and created a cruise ship
boom.
Galveston, so far, doesn't keep figures on the ships' impact on
city revenue. But the industry contributed $44 million to Texas
coffers in 2002, a 37% increase year-over-year.
An easy sell
On one recent Saturday, the port was booming -- and not just
with vacationers checking into their cruise on Carnival's
Celebration.
About 300 travel agents from across the state dropped by to see
the ship, the city and the Tremont House and the Hotel Galvez --
the two hotels that offer pre- and post-cruise packages from Royal
Caribbean and Carnival.
Following their tour of the Celebration, Goldie Asmo, of Golden
Travel Adventures in Austin, sat with a few Travelo-city employees
from San Antonio, including Diane Fernandez and Luis Martinez.
Galveston was an easy sell, they said, especially to the drive
market.
"Cruises put Galveston on the map," Fernandez said.
"There's so much going on," Martinez said. "So much change in
the historic district."
"It could get as big as Miami," Asmo said. "Variety is the spice
of life, and cruises here are not expensive."
Galveston's growth has been fast -- according to the
International Council of Cruise Lines, passenger numbers shot up
nearly 80% between 2001 and 2002 -- but it's still got a ways to go
in competing with major ports like Miami, Fort Lauderdale and Port
Canaveral, Fla.
Just under 1.1 million passengers will sail from Port Canaveral
next year, said Terry Thornton, Carnival's vice president of
marketing planning.
"It would take a pretty sizeable change" for Galveston to
compete against the biggest U.S. cruise ports, he said.
Still, Thornton added, there's plenty of room for this Texas
town to expand.
"It's very significant," he said of the Galveston business. "The
distance of the drive market has astounded us."
Something there
Galveston had never been thought of as a pre- and post-cruise
town -- but it is now, said Ron Guin, the resort sales director for
the Holiday Inn, Hilton and the San Luis Resort.
"It's kind of a double benefit," Guin said. "The cruise industry
kind of reiterates Galveston as a destination. So people in Dallas
or San Antonio see all these cruise ship advertisements and say,
'There must be something there.' "
In the past, Galveston hasn't won the kind of recognition and
reputation that other Gulf Coast towns such as New Orleans have,
and it doesn't have the serene beaches of South Padre Island, a few
hours south.
However, what it does have is the Seawall.
On one side of Seawall Boulevard are hotels, occasional seafood
restaurants, maybe a surf shop. On the other, a concrete wall
abruptly drops 30 feet to sand and to the Gulf of Mexico. People
strolling or biking along the Seawall can spot several offshore oil
rigs on the horizon, shimmering in the Texas sun.
The Seawall was erected to protect Galveston from sea surges
after a powerful hurricane swept through a then-bustling town in
1900 and killed 6,000 people. Galvestonians still talk about the
Great Storm (a 30-minute movie about the hurricane is now a visitor
attraction). To hear some tell it, the city never fully
recovered.
The rest of Galveston slopes away from the Seawall. Many areas
of the city are faded and dusty. But the historical district still
houses Victorian mansions that are intricately restored in detail
and shaded by palm trees.
Nearly 10 of these homes are now open for guided tours or
viewings, including the Bishop's Palace, a self-described
"Victorian castle."
Strolling the Strand
Two city blocks away from the cruise port is a street called the
Strand, the heart of the city's retail experience. The
six-block-long shopping promenade is part oil-country frontier town
and part New Orleans-style charm, with a few Spring Break-looking
bars thrown in for good measure.
The Strand received a $3 million federal grant two years ago
that went to repairing cracked curbs and sidewalks and adding
benches and street lamps. The stores are filled with tenants
selling antiques, Texas kitsch, clothing and sweets.
There are quaint touches like the "No Parking, Carriage Stand"
signs for horse-drawn buggies, and a few smart-looking trolleys
patrol the streets. But the Strand's historical charm also ends
abruptly at 19th Street, where one store shingle advertises Honey's
Oriental Lounge.
New signage, however, eventually will point visitors to
Galveston's other tourist areas, like the Moody Gardens' Imax
theater and indoor tropical rain forest; the Harborside complex
with its tall-ship exhibit; restaurants and art galleries; and
other attractions like the Kemah boardwalk and, someday, the
Flagship Pleasure Pier.
"With the advent of the weeklong cruise ships ... that's made a
noticeable difference, an increase in the number of visitors into
the downtown area," said Fred Wichelp, the executive director of
the Historic Strand Downtown Partnership.
The Tremont and the Hotel Galvez, a resort property located on
the Seawall, have been restored to their former glory. Jackie
Hasan, the Galvez's concierge, said some cruise guests bookend
their voyage with hotel stays.
"Kind of like a warm-up and cool-down," she said.
Capitalizing on the demand, Carnival recently added two
post-cruise tours, one focusing on Galveston history and the other
on transportation.
Hasan said she was enthusiastic about the city's
revitalization.
"It's kind of like we've been asleep for 40 years," she said.
"And now, spring has sprung."
To contact reporter Rebecca Tobin, send e-mail to [email protected].