Owners' Blog.....
Most recent postings are at the top.... (Started in 2010.)
This blog was last updated on January 16, 2011.
January 14-17 , 2011 (staying at 9 Scaup Court)
Friday, January 14
Arrived around 9 p.m. on Friday night, having escaped the winter ice storm that has immobilized Atlanta for the past 5 days. Some traces of ice all along the route from Atlanta to Hilton Head, but not much evidence of ice in Hilton Head. Hilton Head is a little warmer than Atlanta, with temperatures above freezing.
Stopped at Publix on the way into Sea Pines to pick up groceries, including a frozen pizza. Jake's Pizza is closed right now.
We were pleased to find the house in good order, with most everything where we thought it should be. Did discover that the toilet seat in the master bath is cracked, so will have to replace that tomorrow.
Settled in with pizza, wine, and beer, then bedtime.
Saturday, January 15
Woke up to a beautiful day on Hilton Head Island. Art spotted a great blue heron in one of the pine trees even before we got out of bed.
Took our coffee out by the pool after breakfast. Cool, but pleasant. Filled the bird feeder so we could enjoy the show. (After about an hour the birds started to find the feeder.) The pelicans were swimming and diving on the lagoon, as they do in the winter. Saw a great egret at the edge of the lagoon, and when I went to try to take a photo, I realized that not only was there a great egret, but also a snowy egret and a tri-colored heron at the edge of the lagoon. Then I realized that there were hooded mergansers (gorgeous, and my favorite duck) swimming in the lagoon. I don't think we have ever seen that before.
One thing led to another, and Art and I walked down to South Beach Marina Village along the edge of Braddock Cove. Saw LOTS of birds, without trying very hard. When we come to Hilton Head, there always seems to be a "critter du jour," one animal that is so plentiful that it dominates the day. For today, the critter du jour seems to be the snowy egret; they were all over, including a group of about 15 near the dock at South Beach Marina. Uncharacteristically, the water in Braddock Cover was crystal clear, so we could see right to the bottom (very shallow). Art thinks that there's no shrimp trawling this time of year to stir up the bottom.
For those of you who are birdwatchers, here's a list of the birds we saw on our morning walk. I'll also link to photos on the web when I can so you can see what they look like.
The birds were so plentiful and easy to spot that it reminded us of a day many years ago when we spotted five species of woodpeckers (northern flickers, red-bellied woodpeckers, piliated woodpeckers, red-headed woodpeckers, and a hairy woodpecker) on a live oak outside the window without moving off of our chairs at the dining room table at 19 Wren Drive.
After lunch we headed to Furniture Direct to look for a new sleeper sofa to replace the current one in the living room at 9 Scaup Court. Found one we liked a lot in a tropical foliage print, took photos of several sofas to bring home and decide what looks best with the other furnishings. We also want to replace the coffee table at 9 Scaup Court. Saw one we really liked at Furniture Direct, dark wood with a leather inset. This table has four ottomans that slide under it. It's a 4 inches higher and wider than our current coffee table, but that may make it easier to use. Plus, the ottomans have storage, which could be very nice for guests staying on the sleeper-sofa. We can also envision kids loving to sit on the ottomans and use the coffee table as a mini game table. We plan to return on Monday to actually make the purchase.
Obligatory trip to the Grayco Hardware to replace the broken toilet seat, which Art has now installed. (Not all of resort home-ownership is glamorous.)
Got our lattes from Starbucks.
Took a walk on the beach from Tower Beach down almost all the way to Land's End. More surprises at the beach today, another "critter du jour," something we've never seen at the beach. It was just past high tide, and the high tide line looked like it was strewn with piles of pearls, along the entire length of the beach. On closer examination, these were very small bivalve shells (possibly immature coquinas), in pairs, as if still inhabited, but actually empty. (Normally these would be too small to interest a shell collector. However, I also collect dollhouses, and I think I may be able to use the smallest ones to create a shell display in a dollhouse, so I grabbed a handful of the small shells to try to create a dollhouse shadow box.) Also saw LOTS of beached starfish, presumably dead, and many empty crab shells: horseshoe crabs (they seem to shed their shells this time of year, so fairly complete crab shells litter the beach), blue crabs, lady crabs, spider crabs. Returned by sidewalk passing by South Beach Marina Village.
After all that fresh air, we're done for the day. Dinner in. We've made reservations at Redfish for tomorrow night.
Sunday, January 16
Woke up to a beautiful day on Hilton Head Island, with clear blue skies and mild temperatures.
Enjoyed coffee out by the pool after breakfast. Not much activity on the lagoon this morning. A few pelicans and a small group of hooded mergansers (photographed on the lagoon in front of our other home at 19 Wren Drive). Some reasonable activity at the birdfeeder, however. This morning the feeder attracted:
Art trimmed back some palmettos to open up the view of the lagoon. (They'll continue to thrive, growing new leaves from the top.) Amazing how large the leaves are when you get up close and personal. Leaves and stem are well over 6 feet in many cases, and I'm guessing that each leaf weighs 10 - 20 lbs. We hauled the cut leaves off to a clean up spot maintained by Sea Pines. Sea Pines will pick them up, compost them, and turn them into "Sea Pines mulch" (another story altogether).
Took a beach walk just before noon, starting at Tower Beach and turning to the left (roughly east-north-east). A mild breeze, not too cold. Lots of wading birds at the water line. A good number of shells today (just past low tide, so lots of exposed beach) along the wrack line. The "critter du jour" today was starfish, with shells from spider crabs coming in a close second. We passed a few intact sand dollars washed up on the beach, but did not collect them, since they require a huge amount of cleaning to look good (and not smell). I did pick up a variety of other shells, which I may post pictures of later. Hilton Head is not the shelling capital of the world, but if you are patient, you can have a great time seeking hidden treasures.
A striking sight on the beach today was a guy doing what I think is called kite landboarding. That is, he had a huge C-shaped kite, and a skateboard strapped to his feet, and he was using the wind to move around the beach, every so often catching a big puff of wind that would lift him about five feet in the air.
Walked all the way up to the beach walk that crosses up to South Beach Lane at Sprunt Pond Road, then back along the sidewalks. Saw pelicans, ibis and tricolored herons on Sprunt Pond. No bluebirds, which is unusual. We rarely visit Sprunt Pond without seeing some bluebirds.
After lunch, we got in the car to make an outing to Sam's Club to purchase some flat screen televisions for the bedrooms at Scaup Court. (Destination Vacation had requested that we replace our old televisions with slightly larger flat-screen televisions.) Purchased three of them for the three bedrooms, and Art is installing them as I type this blog.
On returning from our outing, I was struck again by how beautiful the pyracantha espalier is near the entry to Scaup this time of year. This planting has been here since we bought the house, and the red berries liven up every winter.
Fabulous dinner tonight at Redfish. It turns out that January 15 - 22 is a designated "Restaurant Week" sponsored by the Hilton Head Chamber of Commerce and island restaurants. What this means is that we were each able to get a four-course pris fixe menu for $27.99 and sample appetizers, a salad, a main dish, and a dessert (of course we also had some wine with the meal). Art and I only duplicated on the salad, so we sampled seven dishes this evening, and can recommend all of them:
Asian Pork Meatball Skewer with pickled vegetables and Thai chili aioli (appetizer)
Seared Jumbo Sea Scallops served with sauteed spinach, lobster macaroni and cheese, and crispy prosciutto (appetizer)
Bacon Blue Cheese Salad with spinach, eggs, mushrooms, red onion, crispy bacon, and crumbled bleu cheese with warm bacon vinaigrette dressing (salad)
Lowcountry Shrimp and Grits served with chorizo gravy and fried okra over a bed of sauteed kale (entree)
Grilled Sea Bass finished with a wasabi cream sauce and soy glaze, served on a bed of udon noodles with wakame salad (entree)
"Key West Style" Key Lime Pie topped with mango and raspberry coulis and fresh whipped cream (dessert)
Blueberry Cobbler served with peach gelato (dessert)
Hope some of you get to enjoy these dishes!
September 3-6, 2010 (staying at 9 Scaup Court)
Friday, September 3
Arrived around 7 p.m. on Friday night. Went down to the beach before we even opened the door to the house so we could see the beach and catch the sunset. Wonderful evening with a brisk wind on the beach, and the sun low in the sky, reflecting fire on the wet sand near the ocean's edge. Lots of people sitting on the beach, facing west, watching the sun go down. On our way back we noted markings for two loggerhead turtle nests just above the high tide mark near the end of the path leading back to Scaup Court.
After we unpacked, we ordered a pizza (a Jake's Supreme) from Jake's Pizza in South Beach Marina Village and paired that with some nice red wine. Pizza was very good, and was delivered to our door as promised. This is something we'll probably do again.
Saturday, September 4
Slept in, then went for a walk down along the edge of Braddock Cove, all the way to South Beach Marina Village, and from there almost to Land's End, then back along the road. Everything is beautiful, as always, and surprisingly busy for Labor Day weekend.
Went over to Wren Drive (between renters) to drop off some new throw pillows and remove the old ones, which were looking dingy. Did some minor furniture rearranging to put things back where we thought they should be. We were pleased to see that the house had already been cleaned and prepared for the next renter, and that everything looked good and welcoming.
Went to Panera Bread for lunch. (Located just north of Sea Pines Circle.) If you are not familiar with it, Panera Bread does breads, bagels, pastry, sandwiches, salads, soups, coffees, and smoothees. Love their bagels, and everyone that I've introduced their Asiago bagels to raves about them. Then picked up a few items at Publix, then our afternoon coffee at Starbucks.
Walked on the beach in the early evening. As we were leaving the beach, we noted a sea gull walking down the path ahead of us. The gull did not appear to be injured, but also could not take flight. We were guessing that it might be a juvenile that had not yet learned to fly. He preceded us all the way back to Scaup Court, where we found him on the cul-de-sac when we returned.
Hung out in the spa and pool before eating in.
Sunday, September 5, 2010
We were awakened fairly early this morning by a knocking at our door. It was the same gull that we saw in the cul-de-sac last night, tapping on the glass of the front door with its beak. When we went to the door to see what was going on, he ran away and we have not seen him since. Hope it is okay. (Perhaps now having learned to fly and taken off?)
Took an early walk on the beach. It was calm and cool. Saw a number of dolphins. Lots of gulls and peeps feeding in the shallow water, made easier to see by the relative calmness and flatness of the ocean. On the way back noted that the morning glories were in bloom along the edge of the boardwalk, which we have not seen that often.
Have been hanging out for part of the day, doing some little errands.
Dinner at Redfish, our favorite restaurant on Hilton Head Island.
Monday, September 6, 2010
Time to leave. Always sad to leave the island, but real life and our paying jobs call.
Go back to main web page for 19 Wren Drive and 9 Scaup Court.
You are visitor number to this web page.
