Destination Charleston, day 2: Folly Beach

taken from my travel journal, Oct. 10th, 2012

For Little Brother and I it was the first time either of us had seen the great blue expanse that is the ocean.
 Another strange, incomprehensible moment as I stood on the sand looking out, thinking that you could set off across those waters and see absolutely nothing for ages -- I imagine it's like driving across the Dakotas :)

Hardly had our feet hit the sand and LB and I were collecting sea shells for mementos and crafts later on. I even found two pair of tiny angel wings.

I had a lot of fun with Jack and the waves, setting different shutter speeds and messing with the aperture. I'm completely flabbergasted, however, that I failed to get even one long exposure the whole trip! I disgust myself!

After a fair amount of splashing in the foamy tide, we gathered up our shoes and wet socks and our bucket of shells, and walked along the beach to the pier. On the way we came across two crabs, one small, and one rather large one (perhaps 6 - 7" across, claw to claw). Both were tragically dead. But after arranging them a little better with a stick, and with LB keeping the flies at bay, they made some fairly convincing photographs.

On the pier we saw many fishermen and -women, all looking suitably bored and sunburned (I have yet to see an excited fisherman).
We walked the length of the pier and up into its tower and sat for awhile, watching the sun play with the water. It would have been quite peaceful and reflective even, had it not been for the shrieking blackbirds that claimed the rafters. The beastly things made me wish for a slingshot.

When we had had enough of the birds and gave up looking for potential shark attacks, Sister drove us a little further East to see the lighthouse. I wasn't terribly impressed, I'll be honest, but my opinion may be tainted by the fact that to get to the view of the lighthouse was a miniature trek through the sand dunes.
But mostly it was the gnats.
 Not five minutes after reaching the spot the beastly beasts descended upon me. They seem to prefer the ankles and ears, but anywhere is fair game. Soon enough everyone was being chewed to pieces and we, along with some fishers who had though they could stand it, ran for our lives back to the car.
 At home we had a late supper of frozen pizza and tea. Always tea.