Just when we thought we ran out of things to write about the dunes….I was going to write about the high tides, the airplanes and the projects Bill has done. 

We left our motorhome here for a week to be with family after the death of Bill’s uncle (age 97 – so he had a fabulous life) and spent Thanksgiving (November 24, 2016) with our grandsons, their parents, and with our son-in-law’s mom, step dad, sister and nephew. We had a fantastic time and came back to a major surprise….hang on.

The fencing posts you see in this picture show where the dunes used to be, prior to Hurricane Matthew. The high tide only reached up to the darkened areas of the beach.  Hopefully, you can see where the row of beach front houses only have a smattering of the beach. I tried to zoom in to better show, but this was the best I could get.

Bill says what he loves about the beach at Myrtle Beach is that it is flat, hard enough to get in a brisk walk (we’ve tried it barefoot and our feet sink too much – and I have very tender feet and a sharp shell could mess me up). BUT as said in other posts, you have to hit the tides just right. It’s important to get the tide schedule upon your arrival to maximize your time on the beach. Here is a snapshot of the tide chart from November 4 through 20, 2016,  from this website.:

Myrtle Beach (Springmaid Pier), South Carolina
NOAA, National Ocean Service

Hopefully, you can see there is a pattern to the tides from this partial month, which changes daily every six hours over a week. It is in sync with the moon cycle, BTW. We walked several evenings prior to the Super moon and it was just amazing! The pre-super moon was reflecting on the waves, making them look florescent. Of course, I didn’t have the right kind of camera to capture it. 😞 But is will be etched in our minds! Here is the best picture from here, I could find to give you a flavor of how amazing it was.

I have so many more pictures, so we’ve uploaded them here if you want to see more amazing beach beauty.

Now, for our surprise upon our return! It was nearly dark when we returned back to Pirateland on Saturday night, November 26, 2016. We had left our motorhome and just drove to the funeral in Pennsylvania and then back down through Virginia. I checked the tide chart and it was high tide when we returned. So we knew we wouldn’t get in a walk. But we had to go see the beach after we ate dinner. Of course, we bought thanksgiving leftovers! Yummy.

I tried to take a picture of what we saw, but didn’t have a camera to use at night. Let’s just say, we were shocked at the HIGH beach dunes! So of course, the next day during low tide, we were out there for our five mile walk:

Our oldest grandson is crazy over heavy equipment, having his own miniature CAT and John Deer equipment. And we also couldn’t help but think about Uncle Warren, as a young man, learning to operate such equipment. He was instrumental in the construction of the Samson Naval Base in New York during WWII, married and with young children and continued to work into his late 80s early 90s.

Click here as we made a short video of this amazing work being conducted!

If you can’t see the video, here is a slide show of the equipment working in sync:

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Watching all of this makes me think:

God is our place of safety. He gives us strength.
He is always there to help us in times of trouble.
The earth may fall apart.
The mountains may fall into the middle of the sea.
But we will not be afraid.
The waters of the sea may roar and foam.
The mountains may shake when the waters rise.
But we will not be afraid. Psalm 46:1-3