Jekyll Island

Georgia – Thursday, Decemeber 27

I headed south along the coastal highway to the town of Darien, where I thought I’d get out and walk a bit. This part of Georgia is very flat, with several wildlife preserves, and lots of marshy land. The Intracoastal Waterway works its way through here, and sometimes there’s a whiff of rotting vegetation. This isn’t a part of the state with solid, sandy beaches! This used to be rice plantation country, and there were signs pointing out sites of old plantations. There are also shell recycling facilities, and I don’t know if those are for commercial businesses, or even individual homes. They eat a lot of shrimp, crab, crawfish and oysters down here, so the end result is a lot of empty shells. Shells (mostly oyster shells I think) are often a component in sidewalks down here.

I was not feeling 100% well, and kind of poked through a walk that was just under 3 miles. Then I needed to rest – definitely not normal. I found a church parking lot, and put the seat back in the van, and actually took a short catnap. And I don’t typically nap!! This was not a good sign. I pushed myself to get out and walk another couple miles, but once again, that was about all I could do before wanting to rest again. I was going to begin driving west across southern Georgia, but the turnoff was near the bridge to Jekyll Island, and I thought maybe some fresh sea air would revive me, so I made a detour. I had to cross several bridges and drive a little ways to actually get there. Sometimes the road seemed to be the only solid surface around with all the marshes and sea grasses around. The island is pretty big, and I got out and walked the paved path along the sand dunes and listened to the ocean. There were other people out walking and riding bikes, but some of the big hotels seemed pretty empty – once again, I was happy to be here without all the noise and crowds of the busy seasons. Jekyll Island is such a dog-friendly place that they had dog water fountains everywhere there were people fountains! There were a lot of environmental signs describing some of the many species of sea turtles that nest in this part of Georgia, and how important it is to protect their habitat. It was a pretty walk, but didn’t do much to revive me. Before it got dark, I wanted to go see the historic part of the island with the grand old hotels. Back in the early 1900s or so, there were lots of very wealthy families building “cottages” and hotels on the island – I read somewhere that 1/6 of the world’s wealth was controlled by people who vacationed on the island. All the buildings in the historic district were built of wood, and all were painted a goldenrod yellow with brown trim and shutters. The main hotel was enormous and fancy, with landscaped grounds, beach walks, tennis courts, and a very-closely mown game area – maybe croquet?

I had parked near the Georgia Sea Turtle Center, but they closed earlier than I had expected – I’ve just been a little too slow with everything today. I still had my animal-related donation to make this week, and this was what I wanted to do. It would have been fun to go in and wander around the exhibits a bit, but I will mail a donation instead, since they had closed. I would love to visit a turtle nesting beach somewhere along the way at the proper time of year.

I finished my walking, but just barely, and left Jekyll Island and started heading west across southern Georgia. I drove a ways, and when I stopped for the night I was too tired to do anything except go to sleep earlier than normal.