Neighborhood

Pelican Island, Galveston

Pelican Island is Galveston’s car-first detour: Seawolf Park’s historic ships, a long fishing pier, and open channel views across the Pelican Island bridge.

The history: Pelican Island began as a salt-marsh sand spit and was built up to its present size largely with material dredged from Galveston’s harbor channel; a causeway ties it to the island proper. Today it holds Texas A&M University at Galveston’s marine-and-maritime campus and Seawolf Park, where the WWII submarine USS Cavalla is open for tours.

Best use: A short car-first detour for ship history and unhurried harbor-channel views.