Have lots of fun but remember, if you think the Atlantic is warm, ya'll come up here to swim in Maine or even Cape Cod. It's a different ocean hereabouts.

Have a great vacation, Annie! I'll be looking forward to your pics! : )

I've always thought our Pacific waters felt warm south of Monterey. North of Monterey - brrrrr! You must be swimming in bathtub temps. lol!

Diana

...Have a great time and remember to use lots of sun screen. Can't wait to see your pic's.

Annette

I feel like I'm on vacation with ya, Annie, just by reading your adventure. Have a WONDERFUL time!

Miss you :-)

Edna

Hi Annette, lucky you to be on vacation and swimming in the ocean. Next time you'll have to come to Maine....ocean swimming is a real experience here....your legs go numb it can be so cold. I love the ocean too and would find it hard to leave warm ocean beaches even for lovely gardens. Maybe you'll get a gloomy day that you can do the gardens...take lots of pictures and have a wonderful time.
Bonny

I'm so glad you are enjoying my state! It is wonderful...if a bit wildly hot and humid.

Thanks everyone. I miss you too, but thank the stars that my DH brought his laptop and we can get a connection. We are here with my DH's parents and sister and hubby and their 2 teenager kids. Our room is on the third floor and that just happens to be the only level in this house that we can get a connect. (happy me!)

The ocean here is not bathtub warm, but it is warm. Feels cool, but you can just go right in with having to get used to the temp, no matter how hot it is. Feels cooler at night but still not chilly by any means. It seems much saltier to me than the Pacific...maybe because this is an inlet...dunno. Is the Atlantic saltier? Body buoyancy is much greater as a result (or could it be that my increased body fat just makes me float like a cork?----hmmmm. :)

They are shooting fireworks again. The Garden City pier is 1.7 miles northeast of our beach house. A nice walk that I have become accustomed to doing every morning. The first day, it was all I could do to climb the stairs every day. I thought I would die from lack of air! I took it a little at a time, and walked a bit further each day and swam out a bit farther each day. Now I am able to comfortably stroll down the beach every morning and having a blast in the surf.

At low tide every morning around 5:30, I go out and comb the beach for shells and things. Most of the shells are broken, but some manage to make shore intact. The moonstones are lovely - tumbled pieces of shell or quartz, about half the size of a dime. So lovely. I am finding black shells, which I had never before seen. Found a piece of branch coral yesterday. That is very rare in the inlet. There were some guys on the beach this morning that had been finding tiny shark's teeth. They gave me one - the best one they had. Very cool!

I am enjoying the children on the beach. they are so cute to watch and delightful to chat with. The Legend of Captain Jack is one that is famous around here. I asked two little kids this morning who were sitting at the shore digging if they had found any of Jack's treasure yet. They looked up with complete earnest and said, "Nope, not yet". I said, "Me neither. Darn." they bobbed their heads in complete agreement of my sentiments. I asked them if they were searching for buried treasure and they looked up and beamed, "Ya!" "Have you found any yet?" "Nah, but we think these might be broken pieces. Not sure" They held up little black pointed slivers of something, and I could for certain say whether they were or were not pieces of shark teeth, but I suspect they were in all actuality slivers of black oyster shells and not shark's teeth at all....but I was not going to spoil their enthusiasm and fun. Darling little sprouts they were of about 5 or 6.

((HUGS))
~ Annie
Down here with some sorry "sunny beaches", but having a great time in spite of it all.

Hi Annie!

I know exactly where you are. My in laws used to live in Summerville, SC ( right outside of Charleston) and I am very familiar with the Myrtle Beach area. DH, sons and in-laws are avid golfers, I am an avid beach comber, so we were all happy vacationing there.

You mentioning the water temperature reminded me of a funny story. My sons are used to warm water temperatures since we vacation frequently along the beaches of the Gulf of Mexico in Florida, TX and Mexico. There is no such thing as getting used to the water, the temperature is like warm, bath water. You can just run into the surf with no problems.

When we were in Maine a few years ago, they thought they could just run into the ocean even though the sand along the shore line was cold and there was NO ONE in the water at the beach in York, ME. (First clue!) Despite our warnings,they ran in and then ran out even quicker. I remember my younger son saying, "It's so cold, it hurts"!

Our sons learned 2 lessons:

First lesson learned that day: that ocean temps. greatly vary between locations.

Second lesson learned: that mom and dad aren't entirely clueless! That sometimes they actually do know what they are talking about! LOL

Have a wonderful vacation and relax in one of those fabulous Pawley's Island hammocks!

Marilyn

It sounds like a lovely place to relax on a "sorry" beach. : ) I love watching kids on vacation -- they always seem brimming over with sheer bliss and wonder at all that surrounds them.

I'm glad to hear you're getting that physical stuff in, too. If you do it long enough those wonderful endorphins kick in and you feel like you can do anything. Of course, your DH might think you've lost it. ; )

"Second lesson learned: that mom and dad aren't entirely clueless! That sometimes they actually do know what they are talking about! LOL"

Those times are almost as precious as their first steps. lol! Another one I love is " You know Mom, you were right." Can't hear that one enough!

Have fun Annie! We are with you in spirit!
Diana, counting down the days until vacation

I grew up right near there!! In Surfside, right up the road and next door to Garden City! Wish I had known you before - I woulda popped in!

i was there too. stayed at 247 s waccamaw. i walked a mile every morning in your direction. we have already booked the same house for the same week next year. loved it and did not want to come home. i live only 2 hours away, but it's still a special time to get together with family and just chill!!!!!

Ah, Annie, it sounds just wonderful. I've swam in the Atlantic a couple of times while down in FL but it's been years. I've never made it to the west coast yet but hope to sometime in this lifetime. We did beach combing too but we were never lucky enough to find anything and ended up buying sea shells at one of the boardwalk stores for souveniers lol. I'm looking forward to your pictures too so I hope you get to see the gardens!

We took three days vacation this past week and traveled to Wyoming and the Black Hills by motorcycle. We had a wonderful time. I have to say though (and no offense intended to Wyoming residents) that I have never seen a more desolate and uninhabited place in my life as I saw in eastern Wyoming. It was 105 the day we crossed western Nebraska and into Wyoming where we stayed over at Torrington. It was so hot you could smell the heat on the grass and sage. It was just such a thick smell that you could really hardly breath. It's all open pasture land but rarely did we even see cattle. More rarely a ranch. Almost no trees and not a single bird...anywhere. It was almost scary (and I thought I lived in the sticks...sheesh!). After Torrington (where we visted Rick's son and his family) we went north. We ran into two old neighbors in a bar in Lusk, WY and spent several hours catching up and telling old stories from years past. Made a really big empty world feel a bit smaller. When we left Lusk we got caught up in a horrible passing rain storm that produced baseball sized hail north of where we were and winds like I have never seen before. I kept wondering how there could be so much wind in a place that doesn't hardly even have any trees. Believe me I was hanging on for dear life, praying that I wouldn't be sucked off the back of the bike. There was nowhere to stop for shelter. The winds were so horrible that it greatly diminished our gas supply and we were fearful that we wouldn't make it to the next gas station. In the end we made it with 15/100 of a gallon to spare and all was well. We spent that night in Hot Springs, SD. Beautiful little town! The following morning we went through the hills very early before the rest of the tourists were up and around. It was gorgeous! We could smell the pines, still wet from the previous days rain. We saw Mt. Rushmore from the highway and Crazy Horse as well. Stopped at Wind Caves but didn't take the tour. Ate lunch at Wall Drug and then drove south through the Badlands. All in all a very scenic and enjoyable vacation. We logged 750 miles in 3 days. Yep, my backside is still sore! Let's just say that we won't be doing Sturgis this year or next year most likely lol! I'm now quite sure that I'm way past 20 something Ha ha!

Hope the rest of your vacation is fantastic, Annie!

MeMo