Pier to Nowhere

We found where all the sand went from those Dauphin Island beachfront homes...

It landed near the Public Fishing Pier a few miles down the beach. The pier is now a good 50-100 yards from the shore line. Funny. But also a bit sad.

We leave Dauphin Island tomorrow (Mon) for 4 nights camping near New Orleans.

One Great Journey Subscribers

Dear Friends, We are currently on Dauphin Island – a Gulf island in the southern tip of Alabama, just south of Mobile. We’re off the road this week to re-group in preparation for the second half of our 11 month road trip around the US. We left Seattle on August 25, 2008 and still plan to be back by end of July 2009. Valentine’s Day marks the half way point of our journey! When we left Seattle we fully expected to update our website – www.onegreatjourney.com – much more frequently than we’ve been able to. Sorry about that. This has been tricky in part due to an absence of regular Internet connections and in part due the incredible amount of time it takes every day simply to get to a place, set up camp, prepare food, clean up, make beds and do home schooling. I’d be lying if I didn’t also mention that we sometimes are just having too much fun to pull back from the experience to write about it! Communications Lane Change What we have discovered is that “Mr. Google” has made it super easy for us to update our free blog site. From our main site, the link is, “Where Are They Now?” on the left side navigation. (It goes to http://onegreatjourney.blogspot.com). We’ve started to lean more heavily on ensuring our blog is updated when our main website isn’t. We’re able to send a short message from our cell phone to automatically update the site, including any photos taken from Doug’s phone. Originally we’d hoped to use a third-party email management system, Constant Contact, to let people subscribe (and unsubscribe) to regular travel updates we’d be providing. This didn’t happen. And it doesn’t look like happening, so we’re closing down our Constant Contact account. From now on, everyone who subscribed will receive a regular email from us when the blog is updated (2-3 times per week, most weeks). You can simply reply to a mailing and let us know if you’d prefer we remove you from future mailings. And you can always just hit REPLY if you’d like to send a message back to us. Happy Valentine’s Day to all! Doug, Denise, Rose and Ruth

Dauphin Island - storm damage end

We took a short drive to see the "other end" of Dauphin Island where they have beachside homes with uninterrupted views of the ocean. But there is a cost... Many beach side homes were either destroyed or just hanging in there after recent hurricanes. Some homes fared better than others but it seemed like only a matter of time before Mother Nature took out those last standing. On this very low, flat part of the island the ocean is coming up to within a few feet of those homes on the Gulf side of the island. Some even have water under them during the high tide. One road we drove down ended right at the beach with the surf break just 10-20 feet beyond that. Apparently Dauphin Island "lost" a few miles in continuous length to hurricanes that created a channel in the middle of the island. There are now two islands, one not yet named. Picture: In the foreground are house stilts cut off at 4 feet high leaving stumps where a home was once built above. Picture: A house on stilts (they all are). Sea water underneath. Picture: End of the road. The 100 yard "road" was sealed when we turned off the main road. It then petered out, eventually merging completely with the beach. We could see the recent high tide mark from the van's drivers seat. Picture: Water in front and back. The distant home is almost touching the surf. The shoreline was pushed back in a recent hurricane. It is only time before the sand and shoreline move even further "inland". This house, like others before it, will eventually succumb to the ocean.