DAYs 21 & 22...Snakes, Alligators and then...the race home

Not much to say here...those reptiles were alive and slithering

Sad to leave the new-found friends--homesick young people who have been Phenomenal being away from their Moms and Dads for 10-20 days...

So we lit out of St Simons like a bat out of...you get the idea.

But we were so enamored with the idea that we should get everyone home---that we forgot we were on a "Road Trip"and drove way too much to get to Birmingham by dinner time.  We passed Plains and Americus Georgia, of Jimmy Carter fame---passed the Civil War Naval Museum, Fort Benning.  Didn't stop to admire the miles...and miles...and miles of rail cars we saw, apparently "in storage" along the highway, camouflaged by thick vines and trees...Really: coal cars, tank cars, flat bed and, later, some unidentifiable cars...just quietly "there". Like the Liberty ships mothballed  near San Francisco in the Carquinez straits ( I DON't think I spelled that correctly).  There were very few rest stops in these parts.  The children were quiet in the back seat listening to Disney Channel, and we just drove.

Lord there is an abundance of trees in Georgia and Alabama and single wide trailers are prominent as neighborhoods.

Don't know what crops we saw---peanuts? pecans?  Annal household income here (thank you, google) is $25K.

We arrived at our Holiday Inn Express  500 miles later, on schedule,  at 6:30---tired and cranky.

Fortunately we met Sean and Chrissie at a local BBQ restaurant  and they were so happy to retrieve their firstborn that we all perked up.  

Victoria was clearly the star the girls focused on, making space at "their" side of the table for her.  After dinner we even went to replace  the bathing suit left behind at Sea Palms (I'm sure they will mail it to us)

We had now driven 2700 miles since June 4....two days til home.

The REST of the Sapelo story

R.J. Reynolds was the last owner of the Island.  He sold it to the state of Georgia.  We met the kids and lunched at the "Mansion", now an 18 room hotel that will only be open if there are 12 guests for a two night stay.  Victoria was all over this thinking it would be a great place for the "next family reunion!"  This was her second declaration for a reunion site as we saw new places on the drive...she really enjoyed our Larkin/McCabe reunion a while back! However, I am not taking THAT bait.

Many hungry people here!

Sidenote: Milk was only offered at breakfast




The Mansion is a remarkable house with indulgences that were a sign of the times:  indoor swimming pool with 18 k gold in the design of the floor.  Don't know just Who gets to see it these days as it was boarded up and covered with carpet.  The ballroom of the second floor was completely designed in a Circus motif...striped Big Top, trapeze chandeliers, frescos of lions and strong men on the walls.  The grown-ups war not quite sure who this was designed for---ballroom or playroom--It easily could have been where you sent your kids with the nanny  OR a major event for mom and dad.  We'll never know.  The basement was THE absolute hit with it's bowling ally where the kids had/got to re-set the pins.  The difficult part was getting the extraordinarily heavy (and perhaps not quite round) ball from kid hands TO the pins

Don't YOU have a Civil War canon in Your Study?



So now the party's over.  We close the Road Scholar segment of our adventure this evening with an ice cream social at the pool and then a final  morning session with reptiles.

Sapelo Island...Day 19

6AM WAKE-UP was not as brutal as anticipated.  The ferry to Sapelo was an hour away and a quiet trip.

Sapelo is as quiet and rural as St Simons is developed.  We were on bumpy dirt roads in a re-cycled school bus  that was previously owned by the Shriners.

There are 70+ residents, all descendants of the slaves who returned to the island after they were freed.  There are three churches, a post office, a store that is open when the tour bus pulls up to get sodas and ice creams.  And this day there was a surprise treat for the football lovers among us...Allen Bailey, defensive end for the Kansas City Chiefs, a native of Sapelo and just a very nice "kid".  He visited with all of us and even took the arm wrestling challenge by (drum roll...)

 ...one of the Grandmas

he never moved

The children were with  the Naturalist at the beach seining (think: netting fish from the shore ...a cooperative effort)..and body surfing
The grandpas were happy to have a picture taken with Allen.

Day 18 Jekyll Island

Tired from last night's midnight mama turtle siting, we boarded our 9AM  bus to tour Jekyll Island.

The grandparents exited the bus to board a Trolley tour of the Island of the rich and turn-of -the -century (20th)-famous.  The grandchildren continued on with AnneMarie, the exuberant naturalist in charge of teaching us all she could about turtles  and beaches.  They were on Boneyard beach ( Many felled trees fallen on the beach...look like big bones) She is the patient, firm voice that guided them through the "boneyard" of trees and rock climbing and a revisit of the now marked turtle nest of last night.  Victoria bonded with her AND  she had the credit card for the possibility of pre-lunch ice cream.

As we waited for our Trolley  Guide one grandparent ( a retired teacher) was heard to  comment"It sort of feels like we've been let out of school..."

The island was found,  a Club formed, and populated by the early Rockefellers, Morgans, and others "of their class"...the big names in finance and industry...before income taxes.  The mansion we toured was not considered elegant or expensive, but spacious and--most important--away from the city stresses of the men.  According to our guide these were sort of the fish camps of the day.  Pretty nice roughing it.
They claim that the Club participants represented 1/6th  of the wealth of the world  at the time.  It was a lovely place-BUT- at least one of the wives refused to go there.  I think I know why, and I am empathetic...BUGS.  I would not have wanted to be there either : not JUST the bugs, but the diseases they carried...yellow fever , malaria --yuck.

Local transport

Mira Rockefellar made it work.  For her this place gathered family and love, God bless her.

The State of Georgia bought the Island for 600 K in 1947 and made it a State Park.  If you want to help It gain a Coca Cola grand prize $100K award for being a favorite State Park go on line and vote for it.  It really IS worth it .  Vote often, competition ends July 15...I say "go for it"!

The evening provided wonderful entertainment  from Gullah/Geechee Ring Throwers.  This group of Sapelo Islanders is intent of keeping the language and traditions of the former slave occupants of this island alive and they ROCKED...kept the attention of kids and GPs !

Road Scholars JOIN IN!

W completed this day with a "walk"---which ended up being an hour and a half through the salt marshes, the charmingly old short housed, the sterile appearing bigger new houses...We consulted Tom's iPhone compass ...RE-found the golf course path...learned a new skill: how to evade the first path of a sprinkler, cross at the middle and walk on.  I'm not saying we were lost....

All are asleep.  I write in the bathroom and will put it on computer...whenever I can, I guess.

Day 17 continued...and a week Summarized

Tori here...
hi everybody. Im back! One thing I've done so far... I touched a SHARK!  It was slimy and a little furry feeling. Eww. It was a baby but we also caught a 2 foot one. Today... June 24, 2012...day 21 ... we got on the road at 7:30 and drove. We have been driving all day while I was sleeping soundly having dreams in the back seat. My dreams were mostly simple ones. I don't remember what they were. But o'well. Tomorrow we are driving home, I'm planning to sleep, and we are all excited for being home. I know I will be able  to share many endeavors with family and friends. My mind feels like it is about to explode with all of the exploits we have shared in the past 3 weeks.

 Last week we went shrimp trawling and we ate the shrimp we caught. And opa had the job of popping the heads off. May I remind you it was with his bare hands and sometimes the eyes popped out first. Thats just gross. Then the next day the grandparents toured and the kids went to the beach to go seigning ...thats fishing off shore with a net. The kids also got to swim. Erica, Andrew, Harrison and I went body surfing though. That was really fun. Erica and Andrew are twins so it was fun to hang out with them. Erica and I are friends. And then after the separate activities we all met up for lunch. We ate lunch at R.J Reynolds mansion. We had a bafet. In the basement there was  bowling alley so Erica and I got to set up the pins. In the upstairs was a circus room. It was like kid  paradise. On friday we learned about reptiles, and that lunging snakes swallow a frog whole, waiting for the frog to inflate its lungs in defense, to finish the meal with popping the frog in the snakes mouth. I gaged when she told us.

What I thought about the whole experience....
Well first off I think the whole friendship and kids was the best part. Everybody was nice and made friends. A boy told us that the best part of the trip for him was meeting and becoming friends with all of us. I had to agree. It was fun meeting everyone. I loved the leaders. Annmarie and Rusty. They were so funny and nice. Rusty and Annmarie made the trip 10 times better. If I would have to rate the week 1 through 5 it would be.. 5 out of 5. it was that good. I recommend it. Well love you all

Bye,
Tori

Susan
At the end of a 22 day Road Trip nothing is as orderly as at the beginning...

Nothing has felt quite so dark as the beach ...at night...with NO moon.   However, Mother Nature had a surprise for us: "biofluorescence"!  an organism in the seaweed that you will have to google since we were allowed NO FLASHLIGHTs so we would not disturb any Mamas we might find, and thus, no notes to write down a multi consonant word.  We had a perfect Milky Way above us and felt we could see the curve of the earth on the wave line before us. ...and biofluorescence to guide our feet.  What more can you ask for?
There are volunteers in jeeps patrolling dusk to dawn to see, tag and protect the mothers beaching to lay their 120+ eggs.  These clever people also had cell phones to call our naturalist to beckon  us to just the correct spot.

There are no photos of this once in a lifetime event for us...only the red lighted naturalists could illuminate the site...turtles don't see red and so we don't disturb them.

She had come here the night before and decided not to stay...thought better of it and returned.  She laid her 2 foot deep nest-ful of eggs in 10 minutes!  a seasoned mom for sure!..( they can take 45 min to 6 hours) We watched her cover her tracks and then laboriously but efficiently take her 250+ pounds back to the surf.  By the end we were all quietly urging her on.  She will not return to these eggs and they will hatch in about 60 days  (protected by the locals against predators of all sorts).  She might repeat this process 2 or 3 more times this season, and then take 2 or 3 years to regain the strength to do it all over again.   One out of  a thousand will survive to be a 35 year old mama hitting the beach for the first time.  It was AWESOME.

We quietly returned to the bus...saw a golden orb spider nest on the way (wow)...and went home to bed...Nature is more than incredible




the spider web

 Different methods:

I should also mention that last night the kids did a service project:  they cut red  cellophane into squares for hotels to give to patrons turtle hunting...they rubber band it over their flashlights to be invisible to the turtles...

Days 16 & 17 Shrimp-Sandcastings & Sea Turtles, Oh My

The Ghost Walk of Monday night was picturesque in the warm Georgia night with Spanish Moss dripping spookily from every tree.  An abundance of strange happenings  on St Simon's Island have produced great possibilities for the return of the complaining hapless victims of these exploits.  We, however, must be non-believers in our hearts because, alas,  we saw no ghosts...and got us to bed around 11:30.


Tuesday morning Sandcasting was a great activity for the sleepy in our group.  An entertaining, retired art teacher taught us the art of pouring cement over the design we made of shells and toys in a sand "frame", also of our making.  Even Opa got into the act and made a very nice wall-hanging.  We are also bringing back sand paintings of various designs...we all got into it!

Opa observing Victoria and Harrison as they create...

Opa getting into the sand painting thing..I needed to be the chronicler , but I did do a sand painting!

After another stelar lunch (three meals a day are going to kill me...)

We headed to the Lady Jane Shrimp Trawler.  (sounds so "Suthen")

The captain showed us how they drag a conical neat just the right speed and depth on the canal floor to collect a myriad of fish, shrimp, blue crabs, ocean trout, puffish, lance fish (we can't remember it's true name.), flounder (it's eyes migrate to be only on one side of him in the first two days...clever) horseshoe crabs, small sharks, spadefish, and on and on... The captain's son pulled the net in and released the purse on the table on the boat.  You have NEVER seen children have so much fun.  They were told not to put their fingers into the mass of fish for fear of "losing a finger"...clearly viewed as a "suggestion rather than a law...

caught by a crab!

Even Opa admired the puff fish

Then we ate the shrimp

and we were happy.

This was all BEFORE we went out at 9PM to stalk the Mama turtles ...

WE  WILL catch up on telling our tales...so much  going on...only 24 hours per day.

What's a body to do??? 

Day 15 How many eggs does a Sea Turtle lay???

AND just WHAT does she weigh????

Hey you guys,
Its me, the best person in the world, Tori. Today we did so many things that were fer-filled with fun and learning. First off we ate break-feast. For break-feast we got to enjoy eggs, bacon ,and cereal. The eggs were a little funny tasting, but good in its own way. After break-feast at 9 am our group and us got on a bus headed for St.Simons/ Fort Frederica. At St. Simons we did 5 things. 1 of the activities that were given to us was learning more history. We watched a war video to accomplish that. Our guid that is our all time historic guid, told us about the haunted jail, and how people hear a certain prisioner talking in all sorts of languages.  Cool huh. Anyway back to the day... Then we got to see wild alligators and crabs nearby St. Simons while exploring the perimeter. After that we were off to lucy at a restaurant called Mullet Bay. If you haven't guessed it was mostly sea food. Harrison, Grandma, Grandpa ,and I shared amongst 2 plates and 3 sides. I mostly ate the crab salad, the normal salad, and the pulled pork sandwich. It was yummy! After lunch we went to a cemetery and walked through it. A lot of babies are deceased from that time. So sad. Then after that we came back to the hotel, got our swim gear on, and went on another bus ride. That bus ride was to the beach so we could do our next activity. Which was Mock Nest. For Mock Nest we un buried a sea turtle baby nest that was 4 days old.  The way we un did it was taking out golfballs and learning more about sea turtles. We dug out the balls from a real nesting hole but that was already used. When we were all done with the exploring we went swimming in the Atlantic ocean.  I just looked of shells though.It was fun though!After that we rode the bus back to here for dinner. We got a cheeseburger, chips and salad. For dessert we had ice-cream sandwiches. They were yummy as can be! I mean they were ice-cream. And now we are sitting here waiting for the ghost walk to arrive. We are meeting at 8:15 to go on the bus and see haunted things. If I get scared I am going to squeeze grandma. But hopefully I won't for her sake.  Anyway  i will be back to feel you about the walk. bye

Prisoners in the lowest level...with the crabs , the damp and the bugs...Soldiers barracks on the upper level
















OUR Troops on the move through the amazing Spanish Moss,.which is neither spanish nor moss...it resembles more the pineapple plant...that's what she said...

Mama Turtle lays between 120 and 150 golf ball sized eggs and weighs UPWARD of 350 pounds.  The Boys can weigh as much as 2200 pounds (visualize a VW Bug).   Here we have  primarily loggerhead and leatherback turtles  Who Knew??  This is Victoria shoulder deep in digging for turtle eggs (ok: golf balls...).  Mama digs them into a 2 foot deep nest...and does this three or  four times a year, every third year..or so.  The educational team is hands on...and VERY PATIENT....SEVEN boys...we have few shrinking violets here.  Bless their little hearts...



Boys pile wet sand

Girls look for seashells

 Some people don't admit they are tired

 Baby graves are identified by the foot-stones

and this is where Methodists sealed their marriages...think it will stick??


John and Charles Wesley tried to establish a Church here and were foiled by a woman named Mary.  I think she had another "business" in mind. .. (this trip is PG) they had too many rules.  The men left, she won, but there is a thriving Methodist community here...now, not then.


The Ghost Walk was fun and interesting...I will study the photos for ghosts...tomorrow...our sleeping arrangements tonight may change through the night.  It is near midnight.


The children are very sweet as they make friends.


Bonne Soir (sorry, I've lost my French spelling)


Tom and Harrison are asleep or reading  just now...so "no comments"


Good Night
Susan