Below is a our trip to Cumberland Island in pictures. We ended up being rained out after two nights, but re-routed our vacation trip to a night in Savannah GA, then a few nights in a cabin in the Smokie Mountains to revisit the location of where we were married 10 years ago, Gatlinburg TN. A fitting trip since we were on our 10th anniversary. I am only going to document Cumberland Island as it will be long enough.
We boarded the Cumberland Lady after arriving in St. Mary’s. You can see three of our five children on the dock. The ferry ride was about 40 minutes and rather uneventful until….. (hint: notice the looming clouds in the background).
The rain started on the ferry about 5-10 minutes before we were to arrive on Cumberland Island. I watched our bags being drenched in the down pour and hoped that they were somewhat water-proof. Hubby finally moved them into a cubby where they weren’t getting too soaked, but by that time the worst had hit them. We donned the kids with ponchos, Caleb refused to where one. He screamed the whole way from the boat to the Welcome Center. I had little Hazel in the Ergo with a poncho over me. She remained the dryest of us all. The above picture is our drenched children (in one of the pairs of clothes out of the three we brought for them). Caleb and Sophie slept through most of the orientation.
This was taken after the rain had stopped, it’s the dock where we came from the boat. Hubby had gone ahead to secure a campsite and the children began to make their first discoveries of Cumberland Island. Chloe found a part of a vertebrae of some animal. Little crabs scurried in every direction. This is also where we spotted three wild turkeys when we boarded the boat to leave.
Cart loaded and we are on our way to our campsite. It was probably a little under a mile walk. Hubby had already taken one cart load to the site. For a family of seven it was pretty amazing that we only took two cart loads.
So a mile walk in this beauty was not bad at all. The picture really doesn’t do it justice. It was like walking into a different world altogether.
Pretty much where Hazel stayed most of the time on the island.
Just looking and walking. You would think that we all would have been dry after our little walk, but with the humidity being 80-85 percent we were still wet by the time we reached our site. I had no complaints though, I was laughing when we got off the boat. The ranger had thanked us for bringing the rain because they hadn’t seen rain in months and they really needed it. I kept thinking to myself that someone very likely prayed for this rain, how can I grumble about it. I will say that I came to that conclusion only after I really wanted to complain about it!
The girls jumping the waves. The night before we had to eat our dinner of tortilla wraps and dried fruit in the tent because of a down pour. It was supposed to be a hot dinner of chicken quesadillas, but that wasn’t going to work with the amount of rain coming down. At least we got camp set up before the rain came. And despite the rain, the next day was beautiful until evening. Here are the remaining pictures of our 4 hours on the beach.
To the right.
To the left. What is missing in these pictures? People!! We had the whole beach to ourselves save one couple and their daughter who took a walk along the beach.
The kids found a huge hole already dug for them to play in. Caleb asked to be buried and he stayed there for about twenty minutes. He probably would have went to sleep if he had his blanket.
Again, Hazel in the Ergo catching a snooze.
I was the first to see a wild horse. I snapped this picture heading back to camp to get ready for lunch. This horse, or one similar, later came strolling on the path right next to our campsite.
The nightly tick check. I have always been a little weirded out by ticks, but this trip kind of cured me of it. We all had a few and after a while it was like getting a mosquito bite. (I’m still praying none of contracted Lyme disease.) This was our second night here. Hubby and I discussed in the tent whether we should stay or not. He really wanted to stay at least one more night and I was willing to tough it out, but told him truthfully that I was having a difficult time with managing Hazel and naps and the rain and nothing drying out. We fell asleep undecided, but Hazel’s body heat in the night indicated she had a fever and that solidified it. We would pack up in the morning and take the last ferry off the island so we could explore the history and old structures (provided Hazel didn’t get any worse).
The next morning Gabe snapped this photo. He noticed the light coming through the trees and just had to get a picture. Of course this day was gorgeous and if Hazel wasn’t feeling under the weather, I’m sure we would have toughed it out another night.
Just some campsite photos. Notice the clothes drying out by the fire. And Sophie happily playing while Hazel slept in the Ergo and Hubby and the kids were off to get carts from the Welcome Center.
A stop to rest on our way to Dungeness. I was going to fill in here a little blurb about the islands history, but decided not to since it has already taken me a month to get what I have done. Hubby says Wikipedia does a decent job of reporting the historical facts. Definitely worth checking into if you ever want to visit here.
The remains of Dungeness. It was burnt down in 1959.
This is a picture of Dungeness before it was burned down.
More wild horses. The middle picture has a colt in it. The above photo was one that I took as two horses were grazing and walked right by me.
Good-bye Cumberland Island. We’ll be back in a less rainy season and without a baby!
This was not at Cumberland Island, but I couldn’t resist sharing a photo of the Little Log Wedding Chapel that we were married in ten years ago. We were so young and so in love then! Walking up to it with our five children was so surreal. We are still fairly young and very much in love, but a different kiss was shared with my husband then the one we shared on that spot ten years ago. A kiss of a decade of shared memories, ups and downs, five beautiful blessings, and of love founded on the rock of our Savior.
