Sat & Sun, April 15 & 16 - Edisto Island, South Carolina & Helen, Georgia

 You read that right.  This is a day that we hit 3 different states.  Neither of us had any idea what the day would bring, but this was a good one!

Adventure Time

Have you ever heard of Edisto Island, South Carolina?  We hadn't either.  Brian's sister mentioned it was supposed to be cool, and we needed to mark South Carolina off our list ... we away we went.  It is an island that is not very developed so it makes it a great location for movies to be filmed (The Notebook, The Patriot, Ace Ventura, to name a few).  I read about Botany Bay and was intrigued.  I'm sure the pictures don't do it justice, but this entire area and beach was other worldly.

There are no stores on this drive, no real tourism.  Just quiet areas where some people fished, hiked, or took their horses out for exercise on the trails.  We did find a BIG pond and stopped to have a look and found more alligators (aka swamp puppies).  Ummm, I don't know how many states those suckers inhabit, but we really did think we left them back in New Orleans.  EEKS!

More Spanish oak lined streets dripping with Spanish moss.

There is a beach on Botany Bay that was like nothing I had ever seen before.  It's called Boneyard Beach.  Can you guess why?

The tide comes up real high on the beach and washes away the sand and earth right out from under the tree roots.  

The entire beach was full of these huge trees that were killed the same way. 

And since the Island is protected so are the trees, drift wood, and all the shells.  There are hefty fines for carrying anything away from the beach.  (Brian assured me he could hear the ocean in this shell!)

This beach was harder to sit and hang out since the tide came so quickly.  No one left their towels and bags on the beach.  They left their things way up on little bluffs.

But the sand was way smoother and we enjoyed dipping our toes in the Atlantic Ocean much more in this area!

On the way out of town we decided to stop at a little shack with a food truck at the back of the parking lot.  The fresh seafood in the shack was pretty well priced and super fresh.  But we wanted to eat cooked food, so we headed to the food truck.  

Brian picked up some boiled peanuts from the seafood shack to sample as we
waited for our meal.  Again, we'd heard of boiled peanuts but this was our
 first time eating them.  I really liked them.  Brian thought they were "fine". 
Evidently, there is a green and a brown variety.  They only had the green. 
Is the brown variety worth trying???

After gassing up in town, we headed towards Helen, Georgia where we'd be sleeping.  Helen is an adorable small town in the mountains.  The story goes that in the 60's the town was struggling and needed to make money.  Someone suggested that towns with a German theme often bring in tourism, so that's what they did.  And it worked!

This town is also right along the Chattahoochee River.  In the summer time there are tourists fishing and playing right in the river.  It was still a bit too cold for that while we were there.  Instead, Brian was blessed to hear me humming or singing the Alan Jackson song the entire time.  Ha!

This was a cute place, for sure.  Lots of restaurants, beer gardens, and candy shops.  Tons of tourist shops.  We had an Airbnb condo right in the center of town that was small, but comfy.  But there was a bit of an odor in the place.  Under the sink there was a stink that could not be covered up by the strategically placed air freshener.  We learned later that a dead critter was found under the condo.  ICK!!!

Since we knew it was supposed to rain the next day, Brian jumped at the chance to try out the Georgia Mountain Coaster.  It's a pretty quick alpine slide.  It would have been better to ride it at least 2 times, but since we arrived so late, Brian only had time for a single experience.  My neck was giving me issues, so Brian enjoyed this one alone.  

We were supposed to do a few hikes in this area, but there was rain and the air freshener messed with my sinuses so I wasn't feeling so great.  We ended up attending a small ward in the area and learning about some places we needed to visit when we headed to our next destination.  Super nice people.

Places to Eat

Muller's Cafe - (looks like website isn't working now).  We shared a plate of chicken with spatzle and mushroom sauce. 

Hofer's Bakery - We thought we'd grab a pastry for breakfast on our way out of town here.  They have a lot of import from Germany of sausages, cheeses, etc.  Sadly, the pastries seemed to be from the day before, so a little disappointing.