On April 9 I traveled to the Smokies for a week of camping and hiking. I learned later in the week that the Reverend Jane Green Wineglass passed away on that Sunday at the.age of 89. Jane was the fifth individual whom I interviewed for the Voices of the Santee Delta oral history project. Continue reading
Category Archives: Santee Delta
Tale of the two great canoeists
These were no two traditional canoeists – Nathaniel Holmes Bishop and Joshua Slocum. Adventurous voyagers, but cut from different cloth. Here is their story with a Murphy Island connection I wrote for the January/February 2016 issue of South Carolina Wildlife: Tale of the two great canoeists.
Lost words
The weekend morning following Thanksgiving was dazzling, the creek’s brilliance a function of the reign of high pressure. The waterway is currently known as Andersonville or Anderson, but on a chart from the 18th century was labeled “Sewee”. The above normal high tide pushed rafts of Spartina Continue reading
Mysteries of the swamp
We effortlessly cruised on our watery path through the bottomland swamp flanking the Santee Delta. The forested sides of the waterway were colored by the newly-emerging spring foliage, reflecting on the creek’s surface: Continue reading
Beneath the surface
History holds court at Hampton Plantation, one of the many outposts of the Rice Kingdom. A colonial era Big House with tours, fine grounds and gardens, historic visits by famous Americans (George Washington, Francis Marion), famous residents Eliza Lucas Pinckney and Archibald Rutledge (the first SC poet laureate) – all these elements and more Continue reading
Elemental lessons
Venturing into the Santee Delta, I would neither be on Kingfisher or solo. I would again borrow a canoe, a Nova 17. from my friend Chris Crolley. After several years discussion, joining me on the trip was Ian Sanchez, a man of many talents Continue reading
Circling Hampton Island
We went cruising in a borrowed Nova – a Mohawk Nova 17 canoe. Before the cruise some challenges arose, including a brief turnaround to pick up a map from home. While shuffling through my keys as I walked around the car I missed the canoe stern protruding past the car’s rear Continue reading
The Delta’s price
This trip would be only the second launch of Kingfisher on the North Santee River at the Poleyard Landing, situated adjacent to the Highway 17 North bridge. The first was a long imagined sail – from the North Santee through the Inland Passage to Charleston Harbor and Remley’s Point Landing (see final chapter of Tracing the Cape Romain Archipelago.) This second was also long planned – to seek out and find an esoteric archaeological site in the Santee Delta. Though this trip was in the back of my mind for a while, a week off from work pressured me to use the time, though I did not have optimal conditions. The tide would be adverse for much of the trip, and my only good rationale for embarking on this venture Continue reading
Looking for the flow
7 AM at the South Island Ferry, and what a surprise – the landing was jammed pack with holiday boaters, getting a jump on the July 4th weekend. I had only seen this landing during the week in the past, and it was always a quiet place Continue reading
Welcome home
I’ve been on the move: not on Kingfisher, and not on the water but many miles on the road. These travels have taken me from the coast to the piedmont and the mountains. Though the movement has been for a meeting, a conference, and several weddings, I have taken the opportunity on these trips to explore the natural world.
Echaw. A Native American name for a creek Continue reading
On Lynch’s Island
I had passed this way many times, heading to points north on Highway 17. It has only been a handful of times when I have stopped on the two and a half mile distance across the Santee Delta between the North and South Santee Rivers. Once I came with Dennis Forsythe, who led a group of people with the hope of seeing a swallow-tailed kite Continue reading
