Hunting Island Scenes Part Two

Photos click to enlarge. 

This plane made a crash landing in the marsh. No one was injured.
The airplane was being repossessed when it encountered engine trouble.
The pilots were rescued by boat.  

The jungle path to the other end of the beach. 

Special beach wheel chairs are provided for the handicapped. 

The 19th century lighthouse from a distance. As a child, I climbed this lighthouse dozens of  times. This lighthouse was specially built  out of large cast iron panels and bolts referred to as "segmented cast-iron".  It can be disassembled and moved.  Indeed it has already been moved once.   Construction started in 1859, but it was destroyed by the civil war shortly after completion. It was finally rebuilt in 1875. By 1889 the beach had shifted so dramatically, that the lighthouse was moved a mile inland. Today, the beach has shifted so much that the lighthouse is barely 200 yards from the surf.  Three lighthouse keepers and their families shared a two story home while  stationed on Hunting Island.  This was not a guiding light, but a warning light for ships to keep away from the shoals. It is located halfway between the ports of Savannah Georgia and Charleston South Carolina. The lighthouse was  decommissioned in 1933 but is now a landmark for the state park. There was no fog horn, only a large bell, plus the oil fed light. A Fresnel lens was used to magnify the light up to 17 miles away.  A Fresnel lens can best be described as an array of prisms arranged in a circular fashion, with steeper prisms on the edges and a nearly flat convex center.

Trivia... Those plastic panels you can install on your rear view RV window, to magnify the area you are backing up towards, is also a Fresnel lens. 

An amazing amount of driftwood can be found on this beach. 

Sunshine finally!

Seashell gifts left by high tide. 

Harley loves to play at the beach!  Here he is digging up the sand, having fun at puppy play. 

 I thought he wasn't learning a thing from me, but I guess I should have had faith.

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