If you tow your boat to Fork on weekends, though, take along any patience you acquired while waiting in line at Six Flags: You'll need it at the ramp. Weekdays are less congested.

Don't forget the Texas Freshwater Fisheries Center in Athens, south of Dallas! Just seeing the fish in the floor-to-ceiling aquarium is spectacular, but they also have dive shows and tours of the hatchery. And you can fish in stocked ponds for trout and catfish -- rods and reels furnished. It's catch-and-release fishing, of course.

SOUTHEAST TEXAS
If you want a metropolitan taste to your vacation, Houston has it. There are museums, concert halls, The Galleria (fourth-largest mall in America), the Space Center, the Houston Zoo, Six Flags Astroworld, a Bass Pro Shops in Katy, a new Gander Mountain store and Minute Maid Park, home field of the Astros. A fan last June wrote, "The Astros aren't doing so well but the games are still great to go to." That was then. The team got better, and came heartbreakingly close to bringing home a world championship. Expectations will be high this year; tickets will be, too.

The best thing about fishing during a vacation to Houston is that Texas' largest city is close to Galveston. And Galveston is a destination itself. Texas Highways magazine ranks it the No. 5 tourist destination behind San Antonio, the Hill Country, Big Bend and South Padre Island. The charm of Galveston's storied past lives on as you drive down Broadway and gaze at the historic mansions that have weathered so many storms. Reports of damage from the most recent one -- Rita -- were exaggerated, and relatively little damage was inflicted on the historic Strand district, which was the heart of Galveston in the late 1800s when the island city was considered the "New York of Texas."

Galveston has also restored the Balinese Room, the Las Vegas-style gambling and entertainment pier, and transformed the seamy Post Office Street of old into an arts and entertainment district. The Balinese Room now offers shows and dining, minus the gambling. And, nowadays, the drinks are legal.

With its Rain Forest Pyramid and Palm Beach (a freshwater lagoon), Moody Gardens is a unique attraction. Next door is a new Schlitterbahn water park. But the chief source of Galveston's allure is its 32 miles of beaches. They're for building sand castles (they even have a festival for that the first Saturday in June), for just walking and feeling the wind in your face and the sand between your toes, for hearing the sounds of the waves and seagulls, and for playing in the surf.

But they're also meant for fishing -- and that's some of the best on the Texas Coast! Many people fish in the surf; many more fish from the jetties and commercial fishing piers along the seawall at 25th Street, 61st and 90th. The jetties are on the east end of the island. Another is a short, breezy ferry ride across the bay to the Bolivar Peninsula. Near the ferry landing on the Galveston side is Pelican Island and Seawolf Park; I'm told the best flounder hole on the entire coast is there. Most people wade and gig flounder, but keep shuffling your feet, and don't step backward: Sting rays can inflict excruciating pain.

Bay and deep-sea fishing charters can be arranged at piers 18 and 19. If you go deep, get some sort of motion-sickness medication. (There's a new one called Scopace that you might ask your doctor about.)