Bald Head Island
05 April 2012 | Bald Head Island
Sheryl
Bald Head Island
First, another note about the Waccamaw River. I’m not good at painting word pictures, but the Waccamaw River is so pretty. I woke during the night, and the half moon glowed on the water, while a whippoorwill called in the distance, and the dark trees reigned supreme.
Despite the beauty, we left at 7 a.m., headed for Southport—or Bald Head Island. Sometime in the afternoon, we determined that Bald Head Island could give us a location to refill our propane, reprovision, and be a new place for us—so we called the marina, and were able to secure reservations at the off-season rates.
We stopped at Barefoot Landing Marina to refuel and get ice. Tried to get pumpout, but it wasn’t working. Shortly before 1 p.m., we crossed the border into North Carolina. Yay! About 15 minutes later, we were treated to a long and furry animal slithering out of the water and up a steep bank. An otter! Our weather has been off and on. When the sun’s out, and we’re sheltered from the wind, shorts and a tank top are preferred. When a cloud comes by, and the wind gets to us (particularly the helmsman), a sweatshirt is necessary. We’ve only seen 1 dolphin today…but it was close by our boat!
We didn’t get into the marina until 6:30, after they closed, but had no problems docking ourselves, and someone gave us the code for the bathrooms. We checked out the surroundings, and found a nearby bike rental place. Also, discovered that the beach was very close, unless you had to have the East Beach, on the Atlantic Ocean.
On Wednesday, after checking in to the marina (took us a while to find the office!), we rented bikes for the day. We discovered that all the roadsigns seem to be written in a strange script, making it hard to distinguish some letters. There are several “Wynd”s—a Scottish word for a winding lane, connecting houses or roads. And, many of the roads are named after birds—but most of the birds don’t seem very visible here. Cars are not allowed on the island, so the “roads” are for golf carts and bikes. We did notice a few small trucks, though—presumably contractors, because Wes found a place to park “ICE”—internal combustion engines, at the contractor site where we got our propane refilled.
The Maritime Market had a sizeable variety, and apparently, also serve dinner, although we didn’t try that. Instead, after riding through the houses along the golf course and a visit to the splendid Conservatory Building (grand opening set for Easter Monday), we toured through the houses along the South Beach, arriving at the Club House for lunch by the pool (with a view of the sand dunes) at the Pelicatessan. After lunch, we had a nice beach walk, journeying from the South Beach to the East Beach, and watching all the waves as we turned the corner (and all the jellyfish washed up on the beach!). There seemed to be an abundance of shells, but most were oyster or clams. The weather was warm and sunny, so lots of people were enjoying the beach and the water. We also enjoyed watching 3 dolphins swimming south by the beach—but had left our cameras in our backpacks!
We rode out to Middle Island, and had a fairly quiet bike ride along a dirt road and some nice marshes leading to the Conservancy’s Ibis Pond, which can only be visited with a Conservancy staff member. We checked out the foot trails in the maritime forest preserve, and were relieved to encounter neither alligators nor snakes, since Wes was trekking in his flip flops.
Dinner was at MoJo’s, in the harbor—we enjoyed our dinner, and a night walk out to the ferry dock afterward—particularly since the strong southerly breeze that had whipped up before dinner had ceased.
Off by 7 a.m. Thursday morning…
Our lat/long to look us up on Google Earth at Bald Head Island is: 33°52.648'N 077°59.985'W.
The picture is of the Cumberland Island horses, trying to quickly get by us on the trail. The white and brown one was a pony…