Plants we
know back home as houseplants with small heart-shaped leaves grow as large as
drum cymbals out here. Less than
one-half mile into our walk across the island, Elliott heard shuffling in the
leaves. He had spotted an armadillo!
Before the end of the day, we'd see more
armadillos, wild horses, eagles, many other shore birds, deer, and some of the
most beautiful seashore I'd ever been on.
I have to admit to you that my view of the island is
changed dramatically by my reading a book called "Untamed," (which I read after we
visited) which is a story by Will Harlan about Carol Ruckdeschel, a woman who was
not from Cumberland Island, but who ended up claiming it as her life's work to
save it and its wildlife from developers and other greedy people. I found it interesting that women, several of
them, had stepped in at opportune times to save the island. I highly recommend this book, from learning
what a commitment of this magnitude had brought for Carol and her amazing scientific work with the sea turtles, and for realizing that there are so many unanswered questions about places like Cumberland
Island. Who really owns the land, who
should be the stewards, and where does the ecosystem, including sea turtles
down to dune grasses, fit into the grand scheme?
We visited the beach, thankfully walking with the
wind as it was chilly (remember, we had gone north again--oh my), and looked for the path to walk back across the island to the Dungeness ruins via marsh boardwalks. I was looking for alligator, but found that
they are more likely to be found in the northern part of the island in the
clear water ponds; we visited the southern part. We saw the decaying carcass of a dolphin,
it's skin weathered black and bones whitened by blowing sand. We saw a small shark that had washed up on
shore. We stayed off the dunes and made
sure to pick up trash and deposit it in receptacles.
We walked miles, stopped for snacks and water at a
beautiful place by the water, and, on our way back, attempted to take a trail
by the river that was no longer navigable easily, except by a teenager who
could leap over downed trees and tiptoe around the edges of the cliff. I bolted towards the center of the island
until I found the real trail again and all was good.
We had been entranced by the beauty and wildness of
this place and left in kind of a daze.
Settled into the dinghy, we
found that our kill switch had been tampered with or just had finally broken,
so Gary, the brilliant man that he is, came up with reverse hot-wiring the
motor, and it started!
A little while after we got back to the boat, we got
a call from the young family we'd met at St. Mary's; they were coming over by
dinghy to say hello and see the boat. In
a short while, they were tied up to us and on clambered two adult men and four
boys. I felt quite outnumbered! It was a great visit, with lots of ideas
being exchanged as this was the guy who was working on the larger boat and his friend, who was a carpenter by trade and had an accent (British? Australian?). They both said they always are looking for more
efficient ideas for the boat and they liked a lot of things about our boat.
I was worried for the boys on the way back
because they'd forgotten heavy jackets, but they said they'd hunker down in the
dinghy (a driving one, like what Elliott wants) to stay warm.
A good ending to a fantastic day! But I wonder where the sunshine and warm weather is?
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