Edisto Beach State Park, Edisto Beach, SC

I love this place – Edisto Beach State Park at Edisto Beach, SC. That is pronounced ED-iss-toe, a Native American word. I could stay here for a long time, but 4 days is all I could get. It was all booked up after that.

Also, I met several lovely women at Edisto, all of whom I wish I could get to know better -- and one of whom I wish I knew her well enough and long enough to call her my best friend. 

  

The Environmental Learning Center is beautiful. It was built in 2004, but looks brand new. It was built with many green ideas, such as water-collection barrels and geothermal heating and cooling.

I took part in several classes, all led by Ranger Ashby Gale. (He was a graduate of Appalachian State.) He taught “What’s on the Menu for Lunch,” “Ravenous Reptiles,” and something about birds – I can’t remember the name.

Ranger Ashby Gale teaches a child.

Ranger Ash with a horseshoe crab.

The walking trails are lovely, wide, and firmly packed; but instead of painted blazes marking the trails, they use diamond-shaped metal plates, some of which are missing. Ex-Governor Mark Sanford was a hiker on the Appalachian Trail (snark), so you would think he would have known about painted blazes. 

On one of my walks, I saw vultures eating a deer -- the cycle of life continued.

They waited for me to pass.

Vultures eating.

  Various scenes from Edisto:

The causeway

Fiddler crabs -- just spots until they all moved -- and that took me by surprise.

Salt marsh

Sunrise

Thanks for reading ---- charlotte1215@yahoo.com

Myrtle Beach State Park, Myrtle Beach, SC

Staying on the nature center theme, the Nature Center here was interesting from the outside, but it wasn’t open while I was here. A schedule seemed to be nonexistent. If it’s open, it’s open, if not……well….. 

The nature center is attractive

On Saturday, they had a “great race” patterned after the great race program on TV. I went to see the start and then saw a few of the racers going up and down the road in front of my motorhome.   

Ready for the race to begin

This park was one of the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) projects built in the 1930s (as was Hungry Mother State Park). I think the CCC was such a great idea that we should have something similar now. Everyone (male and female) should spend a year learning practical skills, as well as leadership and cooperation. Sort of a year in boot camp – everyone is equal, no rich or poor. For example, work a few weeks in a hospice; then a baby nursery; then learn basic cooking, cleaning, carpentry, and mechanical skills. 

The CCC camps were part of the New Deal

The weather was really windy, which makes 60 feel chilly. If it is too cold to do whatever one does in the summer at Myrtle Beach, there isn’t much to do. They sell Hershey’s Butter Pecan ice cream at the gift store. I enjoyed that. There aren’t many trails to walk, but I walked the few that there available. The most interesting thing to do is just watch people in their big campers bump into trees – and there is a lot of that going on.

Looking north toward Springmaid Beach

I know that having multiple vehicle accidents is one of the big signs of dementia, and I believe I saw several people who were well along in the process. The insurance on recreation vehicles is quite high, and I can see why – there are lots of accidents. My guess is that many accidents aren’t reported. I feel sure that the person who was parked beside me didn’t notify his agent about the results of whatever left two big dings in the tree. Another man hit two trees in the process of making a turn and caused a hazardous-waste spill.

Driving – or more important – not being able to drive is a serious problem in our vehicle-oriented society. Driving equals freedom and independence. However, there are many people driving who can’t see, can’t react quickly enough to avoid a wreck, or can’t mentally process all that needs to be thought about while driving. As far as I know, the police can’t make someone stop driving. In Tennessee, they have made it easier to keep on driving as one ages – to save money, you don't have to have an eye exam when you get older; just keep renewing your license through the mail or on line.

I texted my granddaughter, Amy Lauren, telling her that if I should have a couple of “unexplained” accidents, they need to have an intervention. Driving is a privilege, not a right.

Huntington Beach State Park, Murrels Inlet, SC

Our (the cats and me) first major stop was Huntington Beach State Park <http://www.huntingtonbeachstatepark.net/>. I’ve done a lot of walking on the beach (some of it barefooted – even if it is cold) and along the fresh and saltwater marshes. It has been in the 60s during the days and sunny.

Since I’ve been part of Friends of Steele Creek Nature Center and Park, I was really interested in the Nature Center here. I went to the daily “Feeding Frenzy,” which was a 1 ½-hour-long talk and demonstration given by a park ranger – feeding different animals, including horseshoe crabs, alligators, and lots of different fish. We even got to handle the horseshoe crab.  

Nature Center

Park Ranger Talking

Horseshoe Crab, Stingray, and Mollusk (of some sort)

Nature Center From the Marsh

 The land for this park was donated by Archer and Anna Huntington, and their summer home, Atalaya, is here on the grounds <http://www.huntingtonbeachstatepark.net/atalaya.html>. A docent gives free tours on the weekends; but, since I was looking on a Friday, I paid $4 for a "tour on tape" -- and it was well worth it. I learned so much more from the tape that people walking through and reading the signs on the walls didn't learn.

Across the street (US Hwy 17) is Brookgreen Gardens <http://www.brookgreen.org/>, the property of which was also donated by the Huntingtons. There isn't much blooming this time of the year, but that didn’t matter – there are more than 1,700 sculptures done by more than 400 artists, one of whom was Anna Huntington) in the gardens to look at. 

Tomorrow will be my last full day here, and I haven’t decided which park I will go to next. On my to-do list is to find a post office. They had stones and shells for sale in the park gift shop, and I couldn't resist buying some for my uber-talented, jewelry-making grandson, Josh.

 Thanks for reading.

Low Imagination Equals High Disorganization

We (the cats and I) are waiting for Tom Johnson Camping Center to get our minor electrical problem fixed – which requires waiting for a part that will be here Monday (something to do with a converter board). The wait has actually been a good thing because it has given the cats time to explore and me time to put things away. I’ve heard it said that there’s a place for everything and everything has a place, but that doesn’t apply to me. I’ve never been able to find all those places – and that is even more true in the motor home. 

On Friday I walked to the Carson House, but it was unexpectedly closed. <http://www.historiccarsonhouse.com/> So I walked in the other direction and found a Dollar General. Dollar Generals are like 7-11s used to advertise: “If it’s not around the house, it’s just around the corner.”

On Saturday, I walked south, going past a manufacturing place called <Resistoflex>. I asked the person at the guardhouse questions about what they do. He did mention that they used Teflon to line their pipes. (DuPont knew that Teflon was poisonous years ago, even though they’re still fighting about that.) I’m currently reading “Toms River: A Story of Science and Salvation” by Dan Fagin <http://www.amazon.com/Toms-River-Story-Science-Salvation/dp/055380653X>, and I imagine that every manufacturing place is still dumping toxic chemicals straight into rivers and streams, including the one that runs by the campground here. That certainly was true for all manufacturing places many years ago and is still true for some places today. People who complain about the EPA and the Clean Water and Air Acts have no idea what it was like years ago. For one example, read about Lake Erie catching fire http://clevelandhistorical.org/items/show/58#.VtRSsuaEpVc.