last day at cape san blas

CAPE SAN BLAS - This is our last day here at Paula’s pleasant cottage on Cape San Blas. So perhaps it is a good time to reflect generally on this beautiful and interesting area.

It is called Florida’s Forgotten Coast and though it has now been discovered for sure, the construction on the beaches is much newer than, say, the construction near Charleston and Georgetown or even Hilton Head, and it is almost all detached single-family homes and small beach-oriented businesses with very, very few multi-story condos or other large structures. Predictably some homes are more tasteful and some more storm-worthy than others. Except for a few gated communities, the beach areas around here are the opposite of planned. There is good public beach access for those not on the front. Traffic on Cape San Blas Road is 1/1000 that of Palm Blvd at Isle of Palms.

New San Blas beach houses.

Interesting!

Also to the good is the fact that the area, in addition to having a large supply of small restaurants—we’re heading out for the local barbeque tonight having eaten our share of oysters—is surrounded by protected areas—state parks, national forests and national wildlife refuges.

When we refer to “the area,” it would extend from St. Marks NWR westward to Port St. Joe. See map at the bottom of this post. In the middle is attractive Apalachicola, and on either side of the town are two grand features, a cape and an island, both extending out into the Gulf. The ends of both Cape San Blas and St. George Island are capped by lovely state parks.

We visited St. George State Park yesterday. Perhaps we are prejudiced by our base here on San Blas, but we prefer it, though St. George is striking. Perhaps it was because the St. George ranger asked our dogs to leave the beach, while we, tails between our legs, could only follow. Since it was a chilly, cloudy day and we were the only people on the beach, Gus turned to ask the Ranger for one good reason to enforce the rules in such circumstances, but, uncharacteristically, he kept his question to himself.

Dogs lead Gus down San Blas beach.

Capers riding the waves; Weezie watching.

It is a good time of year to be here. The temperature moves around 80 degrees; it's time for shorts. The wintering birds seem to have mostly departed, but there are plenty of herons, egret, mergansers, pelicans, cormorants, terns, waders, ospreys, hawks, grebes, and more. This morning we saw a new bird, the Eurasian Collared Dove, established in Florida in the 1980s and now spreading out across the country.

Paradise is not total here. All of the land around here is very low, and the combination of sea level rise and greater frequency of strong hurricanes increases the risk of flooding, powerful winds, storm surges, and huge damage. On the way onto San Blas the road is currently saved from the encroaching Gulf by a long row of giant rocks. See photo. Soon it may be San Blas Island. Meanwhile, the Riverkeepers in Apalach say that loss of freshwater flowing south out of Georgia is a main problem for the region’s all-important fisheries. Apparently, freshwater removals even as far north as Atlanta contribute. For example, the Flint River flows south out of Atlanta all the way down through Georgia to Lake Seminole on the GA/FL border, and the Apalachicola River then flows out of Lake Seminole. It is easy to see why there is conflict between Georgia and Florida over water use in the region.

The wall of rocks. If you click on the picture, that's Gus standing down there.

Water use issues are springing up all over the south, a region where fresh water was once thought endlessly abundant. See Gus’ recent op ed in the Charleston newspaper linked here. There’s a beautiful photograph of the Edisto River at this link: http://www.postandcourier.com/article/20150405/PC1002/150409613/1268/south-carolina-x2019-s-treasured-rivers-need-protection&source=RSS

And so it goes.

Sorry, we haven't learned how to rotate photos yet.