Cumberland Island

The kids and I recently took a day trip to Cumberland Island National Seashore with some friends of ours.  I cannot believe that we live so close to this gem and have never visited.  It is amazingly beautiful.  The majority of the island is designated a national seashore.  It is pretty much wilderness- you have to bring all food and drink with you because once you get on the island nothing is sold.  The only cars on the island are the few that are used by national park personnel.

The island can only be reached by boat, so we booked passage on the ferry in advance.  We arrived at the main land visitor's center about 30 minutes prior to sailing and enjoyed checking out the few exhibits that they had.

Before boarding the ferry, we listened to the ranger's orientation speech.  We had five hours on the island and we had to be at the dock for our return trip (or we'd be stuck on the island). There were two docks where we could re-board.  The ranger suggested that we get off at the southern most dock, explore the island, and then re-board at the Sea Camp dock for the return trip.  We decided to follow his advice.  It was a little chilly on the ferry ride, so we sat inside and ate our picnic lunch.

Upon reaching the island, we disembarked to find a dirt road lined with live oak trees.  The main thing that we wanted to see on the island was the wild horses.  We had hyped the horses up so much to the kids that not seeing them would have probably been a disaster.  As we walked down the road, the kids kept their eyes peeled for horse tracks.  These were not hard to find.

After a short hike we reached the Dungeness Ruins.  Dungeness was a large estate built by the Carnagies (Cumberland was a private retreat for the wealthy back in the day).

We continued walking until we reached the old cemetery.  We had seen lots of horse tracks and manure, but no horses.

As we set out over the marsh, we finally spotted 5 feral horses grazing in the distance.  The kids were super excited.

We got off of the boardwalk and tried to get as close as we could to these wild animals.  They were out in the marsh, so we had to stop once the ground got muddy.

After taking several pictures of the grazing horses, we returned to the marked path and started making our way over the dunes toward the beach.

As we were walking toward the beach, we heard a rustling in the brush.  A young horse popped out about 20 feet from us.  I think we startled him (and he certainly surprised us).  He stood there and looked at us for a minute and then walked away.  We were all standing there with our mouths hanging open.  This was the highlight of the trip.

After our wild horse encounter, we continued to the beach.  I know I am usually hard on the beaches of Georgia  (because they suck), but the beach at Cumberland was actually quite nice.  It reminded me a lot of Fernandina but it was wider and there was hardly anyone on it.  It was too cold to get in the water, so we walked down the beach and tried to identify the shells and creatures that we came across.

 

We exited the beach near the Sea Camp dock.  We crossed the dunes to find ourselves in a beautiful maritime forest with live oaks trees.  These trees had large, low-hanging branches.  They were practically begging to be climbed, and the kids were happy to oblige.

After a snack and short break we made our way to the Sea Camp area so that we could board the ferry.  We got there a little early and were able to hear a ranger program about identifying shells and wildlife on the beaches of Georgia.  It was interesting,  Our day ended with a ferry ride back to the mainland.  I was really very impressed with this island and am looking forward to a return trip.