Getting back to Jekyll Island

When we arrived on Sept 16 the love bugs had not attacked but the mosquitoes sure did and they were a bother all week. No big problem though - just spray down and try to ignore. The Derums joined us the same day and we set up camp sites. We happened to plan our dates just right because the next day the "Shrimp & Grits" festival cranked into action. Mandy, Braxton, and Brice joined us Friday evening and we feasted at the festival's preview. Wow, really good food and music and crafts to take in. I think that Karl even took some left overs back to Light'ning the wiener dog.

Saturday night we hooked up with our GBI/GSP friends at the world famous Buccaneer seafood restaurant about 30 miles north of Jekyll. This gave Karl the golden opportunity to tell his jokes to a new crowd (thank you lord). This week the Peace Officers Association of GA held it's annual conference at Jekyll Is and I attended some training classes while the rest of the crew hiked, explored, biked, ate, and listed to some more of Karl's jokes...

A couple of days later our other good camping buddies, Butch & Bonnie Lenoir, joined us and brought some more fun with them. Between Butch's and Karl's stories, and Bonnie's cooking we were really set for the week. With a low country shrimp boil on one night and a blue crab steamed meal the next, we kept culinary skills honed and our bellies full!

The rest of the week was spent swapping stories and rig skills, biking and exploring the beaches. Karl taught Braxton and Brice how to play 5 card stud and they ended up winning all of his and Cookie's chips! Of course I played it safe and just watched the sharks circled the table.

If you ever travel to Jekyll Island be sure to visit the GA Sea Turtle Center/Hospital. Very interesting. You can even adopt an injured turtle. Once healed, the center straps a tracking device on it and you can follow it via computer/internet as it travels the oceans. Pretty neat. Mandy and the boys adopted a 100 lb turtle named Phantom. It is expected to be returned to the sea in the next month and then they can follow it as it swims the Atlantic. Very cool.

Jekyll Island camping had been on our calendar since last spring and we knew it would be another fun week. Having our camping buddies with us made it even more enjoyable. And of course with Mandy and the boys with us, there's always another adventure around every corner.

(If you want to see a full set of pics and the other love bugs on the beach you can go to my face book profile.)

By the way, these days are not for trade for anything...

Pappy

Catching up this blog

Last post was in June on our Gulf Coast trip - since then we've been to MISTLETOE STATE PARK near Thomson-Augusta, YOGY BEAR KID'S PARK near Breman, TALLULAH GORGE STATE PARK at Tallulah Falls (and white water rafting on the wild Chattooga River. This week we've been at JEKYLL ISLAND CAMP GROUND. Here's a few pics from the River to catch up.

(I've been waiting for way toooo long to up load these two lonely pics - the wi-fi in this park is way slow and I'm giving up for now) Catch you later.