We drive north heading for Wilmington NC. , a place we have not been before. Jay has made a reservation at a “luxury” inn. Usually we research a location before descending upon it. As the resident travel agent I was glad to take a break from my duties but as we pull in to the city it is clear things are not as advertised. We check the GPS and confirm we are near to the inn, but the neighborhood looks more like a war zone. The inn’s website sported a horse-drawn carriage, gaslights and romantic ambiance. We pull up and we see what looks like the House on Haunted Hill. There is no parking - on the street if you dare, no carriage, the horse probably ran away. We quickly scan Trip Advisor, something I do in advance especially with these “inns”. Previous guests complain of being locked out at night (not advisable in this neighborhood) cranky innkeepers who don’t allow you to touch anything – I guess you have to sleep levitated above the bed – No wine in the room – you’d need plenty of it to pass out in this place. I call to cancel the reservation, no one answers, how convenient. We scramble to find a hotel for the night. The “inn keeper”, who sounded like Lurch on the Adam’s Family, calls eventually to inform us we get no refund and no sympathy. That was a 600$ plus mistake I recommend you don’t make. See if you can find the haunted inn but don’t stay there - the skeletons in the closet will keep you up at night.

After a month in Florida, it was time for us to start moving north, as I need to be at a meeting in New York City in late April.  Our Key West neighbor told us we should definitely try to squeeze in some time at Jekyll Island, Georgia, so we took his advice and headed to one of Georgia’s southern most barrier islands, along the southeastern coast of Georgia.  Native Americans have been visiting JI for about 4500 years, and European explorers showed up in the mid-1500s.  Jekyll Island was colonized by the British in 1735, and by 1800 it was privately owned by a French buddy of King Louis XIV, in need of escape from the French Revolution.  The famous Jekyll Island Club was formed in 1886 when a group of wealthy American industrialists – including William Rockefeller, JP Morgan, Joseph Pulitzer, and William Vanderbilt -- purchased the island for a winter retreat.  Membership was limited to 100 people, and the initial group of 53 purchased shares for $600 apiece.  The enormous “club house” and “cottages” they built along the water’s edge are now part of a 246-acre national historic landmark; the “club house” is a resort hotel, with a regulation croquet court on its front law.  We rolled up on our bikes on Sunday morning in time to catch that day’s match, with players in their requisite “whites”:

 
The island reverted to ownership by the state of Georgia after WWII, and by law, 2/3 of it must remain undeveloped.  One of only four Georgia barrier islands connected to land by a causeway, the island is 7 miles long by 1.5 miles wide, and there are more than 10 miles of wide, flat pristine beaches with complete and easy public access, and 20 miles of hiking trails.  There’s a beautiful 18-acre wooded campground on the northern end of the island, and we found ourselves spending a week in late February in this idyllic setting:

 (Photo note:  Kona is out on her tether, and we've added a Key West Southernmost Point buoy  -- hanging off the infamous right front mirror -- to go with our pink flamingo, as part of our exterior rig decor.)
We ran the dogs on the beach every day, biked around the island and along the beach, took a horseback ride on the driftwood beach along St. Simons Sound, and hiked through the maritime forest and tidal marshes. 

A morning walk on Driftwood Beach, looking across St. Simons Sound

I joined in a local tai chi class one morning while Hank went for a run on the beach.  While the lack of development meant we could enjoy maximum scenic beauty and outdoor activities, we did find ourselves a longing for a wider selection of restaurants after a few days.  On an island with no gas station, one tiny grocery store, and marginal cell phone coverage, we had to go to nearby Brunswick, GA, on the mainland, for supplies and good food.  Brunswick’s not exactly a booming metropolis either, but we stumbled onto a fabulous restaurant, Cargo Portside Grill, in the town’s historic district.  Yum!  Definitely worth a stop if you’re in the neighborhood.  The weather was marginally cooperative, but one day was cold and rainy, so we drove over to nearby St. Simons Island to look around.  Without JI's development restrictions, St. Simons was full of mid- and high-rise condos and apartments on the beach, with limited access, and we were happy to head back to our little slice of paradise. 

Did I mention that Jekyll Island was the site of a secret 1910 meeting of financiers to reform the banking system, the result of which was the formation of the Federal Reserve System?  You just knew those rich guys were off plotting how to take over what little bit of the economy they didn’t already control, right?  J  Perhaps they could go back and meet again now . . .

Happy with our week of communing with nature, we were excited to head north to Savannah.  At Hank’s suggestion, I bought the longtime NYT bestseller “Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil,” set in the historic district of Savannah, to prepare for our arrival there.

Filed under: south shore long island