Kiawah in the Fall

The kids and I spent a week at Kiawah Island. My sister Kelly was able to spend several days with us as well.  It was a trip full of new experiences and much relaxation!

We rode our bikes all over the island and found two of the marsh view towers. 

 The views were spectacular.

 
  One of the towers is on an island nature area.
In the middle of the week we took the ferry from Charleston to tour Fort Sumter for the first time.

The fort was really interesting and the park ranger talk was really well done. 

I find listening to the park ranger talks to be the best part of visiting our national parks and monuments. 

The gentleman telling the story at the Wright Brothers Museum in Kill Devil Hills, NC had the entire crowd so enthralled that many of us were moved to tears with his retelling of the story.  

But I digress. 

Unfortunately, you're only allowed a short time to explore the fort (less than an hour) and we felt we had to rush through to see as much as we could.

One thing that took up a lot of time on the fort was finding all the answers to the Junior Ranger questionnaire.

Back on land, the kids passed their test, took the oath and got their Junior Ranger badges as well as their names on the Junior Ranger wall of fame.

The last of firsts on this trip was kayaking the Kiawah River.  It was hot and exhausting but fun. 

We also had the added pleasure {sarcasm} of paddling against in the incoming tide on our way out and against the outgoing tide on the way back in.  

We'll definitely check the tide schedule before the next time we go out!

And so you can say you learned something while reading this, the Kiawah River is not an actual river but is instead a salt marsh and estuary. Now, don't you feel smarter?

We had a wonderful visit and look forward to getting back down to KI in December.