Driving down Jackson Street toward Commerce, parking spaces are sparse near the old intersection that’s a historic crossroads in downtown Harlingen. The MOFI Nutrition – Energy Bar has something to do with this new burst of energy near Jackson and Commerce. Walk into the business and you get a warm welcome with the music of a fitness gym beating behind the shortened wall of the MOFI’s front counter. Kaci Spikes-Kemp…
In 1997, the limits of north McAllen didn’t go much past Trenton Road, with the first signs of development just beginning to take shape in the form of a sign promising a new H-E-B on the way. From that corner of Trenton and 10th Street, it was a trek much further north on adjacent Ware Road as it went past state Highway 107. Farmland with scattered duck ponds is what…
It all started with a coupon book. Kristi Collier in those early years of the 2000s had worked for the Red Cross. It gave her entry to RV parks across the Rio Grande Valley in seeking Winter Texans who could volunteer for Red Cross activities. Her second job with a title company ended in 2007 due to the housing bubble crash of the Great Recession. By then, Collier had started a…
Manuel Hinojosa walks between the exhibit rooms of the Brownsville Museum of Fine Art, the faces of his sports heroes looking back at him. Many are childhood heroes – the boys of summer – be it Mickey Mantle or Willie Mays, with current stars like Jose Altuve of the Houston Astros included among the baseball greats. Hinojosa himself is wearing an Astros cap, as he often does, a smile underneath…
Joe Garcia leans out of his Casa de Hibachi food truck to talk cuisine. “We did research, at first watching more for amusement, but then we figured let’s do this,” Garcia said of he and his partner Ray Cano. “Let’s add our twist to it, cilantro, limes, the things from our culture. So that’s what we’ve got, a fusion.” The mixing of Japanese and Mexican food cultures is just one…
Kristi Collier had an upfront message recently when addressing a luncheon attended by several hundred community and industry leaders connected to tourism in the Rio Grande Valley. “The number of Winter Texans isn’t growing,” said the president and CEO of Welcome Home Rio Grande Valley. “It’s on the decline.” The message was delivered during a luncheon on April 22 at the Victoria Palms RV Resort in Donna. Collier presented highlights…
The intersection of 2nd Street and FM 491 for decades is where Mercedes residents and commuting Rio Grande Valley motorists could find the Ten-Ten Grocery Store. The beloved store that sold comic books, pickles and fishing bait closed in 2013. There’s a new business rising on the very spot where the Ten-Ten stood. It’s a Sonic Crush Drive-In. Community and business leaders gathered for a ground-breaking ceremony to celebrate the…
The city of McAllen has fared well in recent national surveys when it comes to best communities of its size for places to do business and ranking high for public safety. This week the city learned of another distinction. The home-search website Ownerly.com lauded McAllen in ranking it at the top of its Best Zoom Town Cities. The ranking cites affordable housing, high-speed Internet accessibility, outdoor green spaces and good…
Ruben Sanchez’s man cave doesn’t feature the usual bank of big screen televisions and pool tables, with a stuffed deer head or two mounted on the walls. For Sanchez, it’s “my sanctuary,” a place to retreat within himself to take away “a lot of my demons.” He is a Purple Heart recipient and former airborne paratrooper who uses his getaway to assemble handmade fishing rods in a converted garage of…
The South Padre Island spring breaks of most recent years were quite different from those that came before them. There were lower numbers but some good came out of the leaner seasons of 2020 and 2021. The imagery of rollicking college-aged students was replaced by the more mature demographic family groups. There were fewer crowds to get through with the temporary decline of college youth on semester breaks. The pandemic…