{"id":891,"date":"2014-12-01T04:46:24","date_gmt":"2014-12-01T04:46:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/aweewalk.com\/?p=891"},"modified":"2018-04-18T04:25:04","modified_gmt":"2018-04-18T04:25:04","slug":"georgia-coastal-islands-part-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/aweewalk.com\/?p=891","title":{"rendered":"Georgia coastal islands, part 2"},"content":{"rendered":"

After two nights at Bradley Point one option was to stay a third night if the conditions were too trying to head off. \u00a0Such a strategy would have made the following days longer and removed all future flexibility in the schedule. \u00a0The group decided to move on, with the understanding that if the going was too rough we would turn around and come back to the campsite.<\/p>\n

We paddled westward for several miles in the inlet between Wassaw and Ossabaw islands. \u00a0Both wind and current were in our faces, which made for a tiring and choppy, but not especially tricky, morning. \u00a0Eventually we got to the entrance of the north-south creek through Ossabaw Island, and entered it.<\/p>\n

On an incoming tide, water flows into such creeks from both the southern and the northern ends. \u00a0As a consequence, there’s a place somewhere near the middle of the island where the two fronts of rising water meet–“the dividing.” \u00a0On this day, Don kept us going until we got to the dividing so we could take full advantage of the tidal assist.
\nWe were quite tired when we got to that estimated place and finally took a break. \u00a0There was no high ground, only a Juncus<\/em> marsh in ankle-deep in water.<\/p>\n

Some people found ingenious ways to rest.<\/p>\n

\"Georgia<\/a><\/p>\n

Our desire on the trip was to live at least partly off the fat of the land–which is to say off our, or somebody else’s. fishing. \u00a0 Don and Eric Schwaab fished often and caught nothing, and the few other anglers we saw were similarly unlucky. \u00a0We saw some shrimp boats far off, but \u00a0failed to get their attention. \u00a0However, we did run into a crabber farther down this creek. \u00a0We bought $35 worth of blue crabs, all of which, he\u00a0told us,\u00a0were bound for Maryland, \u00a0where the demand \u00a0was higher and the supply smaller than here.<\/p>\n

Without going ashore (but with help), \u00a0Don managed to empty his back storage hold for the crabs. \u00a0After landing at the camping spot, at the southern end of Ossabaw on Jacobs Creek, we off-loaded \u00a0them.<\/p>\n

\"Georgia<\/a><\/p>\n

We swam in the creek, as did a dolphin, its dorsal fin appearing periodically as it herded fish into the bank. \u00a0(You can see it in the distance on the left).<\/p>\n

\"Georgia<\/a><\/p>\n

The next day the conditions were finally right to go outside. \u00a0We crossed yet another inlet, this time in perfectly calm water, and started down St. Catherines Island. \u00a0It was thrilling to be in the ocean.<\/p>\n

\"Georgia<\/a><\/p>\n

We came ashore at a mid-island creek–McQueen Inlet–through breaking swells, an exciting ride. \u00a0The initial choice of a campsite was abandoned because we thought it might have bugs when the wind fell off in the evening. \u00a0Instead, we crossed the inlet to a dogleg of beach, where there was a perfect place.<\/p>\n

A buoy had washed ashore, evidence of how rough the weather could get.<\/p>\n

\"Georgia<\/a><\/p>\n

I went swimming.<\/p>\n

\"Georgia<\/a><\/p>\n

Bob cut trivets–mementoes of the trip–out of a piece of cedar that was so red it appeared to bleed on the sand.<\/p>\n

\"Georgia<\/a><\/p>\n

We had plenty of room.<\/p>\n

\"Georgia<\/a><\/p>\n

Don had along with him in a watertight Pelican case a library of books on the region’s natural and human history. \u00a0It contained a copy of the secret journal that Frances Anne Kemble, an English actress, kept from her sojourn on plantations on Butler and St. Simons islands in the winter of 1838-39.<\/p>\n

Known as “Fanny,” \u00a0Kemble in 1834 \u00a0married a Philadelphian named Pierce Mease Butler, who inherited three plantations in South Carolina and Georgia early in their marriage. \u00a0Kemble was an abolitionist and hoped to convince her husband to free his slaves on a visit they made to the holdings. \u00a0She was appalled by the working conditions, punishment, housing and sexual exploitation she saw, recording her findings in a journal that wasn’t published until 1863, long after she and Butler divorced.<\/p>\n

Butler didn’t free his slaves. \u00a0But threatened with bankruptcy, he sold about 450 of them in 1859. \u00a0The event was so large that The New York Tribune covered it. \u00a0Its correspondent wrote: \u00a0“The buyers were generally of a rough breed, slangy, profane and bearish, being for the most part from the back river and swamp plantations, where the elegancies of polite life are not, perhaps, developed to their fullest extent. In fact, the humanities are sadly neglected by the petty tyrants of the rice-fields . . . comprehending only revolvers and kindred delicacies.”<\/p>\n

I read three excerpts from the journal–her writing is clear, detailed and unflowery for its time–as we tried to imagine what had gone on almost beneath our feet and fire.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"Georgia<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

After two nights at Bradley Point one option was to stay a third night if the conditions were too trying to head off. \u00a0Such a strategy would have made the following days longer and removed all future flexibility in the schedule. \u00a0The group decided to move on, with the understanding that if the going was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"video","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-891","post","type-post","status-publish","format-video","hentry","category-georgia","post_format-post-format-video","post-preview"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/aweewalk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/891","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/aweewalk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/aweewalk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aweewalk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aweewalk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=891"}],"version-history":[{"count":35,"href":"https:\/\/aweewalk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/891\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2719,"href":"https:\/\/aweewalk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/891\/revisions\/2719"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/aweewalk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=891"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aweewalk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=891"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aweewalk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=891"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}