Featured in this photograph is a small section of Padre Island, an elongated, sandy barrier island in the Gulf of Mexico just north of Brownsville. This barrier island, which separates the Texas mainland from the Gulf of Mexico, creates Laguna Madre, a wide lagoon that produces a dynamic, ever-changing, sandy landscape. Pockets of sand dunes are apparent inland from the coast (bottom center). Two linear features are discernible—the Intracoastal Waterway between Padre Island and the mainland and an east-west-oriented dredged canal that cuts through the island. Cultivated field patterns are visible (lower right corner).