ONLINE FINALLY!

It has been a whole week since we were in a location to have good wireless access. I haven't been able to boog, check email, or read my friends' blogs. We are finally in a place where I can get access, although it's a strange location to be sitting to blog! I am sitting 20 feet away from a climbing wall in the outdoor recreation center at Charleston Air Force Base. The RV sites are just down the road, and the nice young man said this building was wireless, so we were welcome to come up here.

Since our tour of Saint Augustine we have been to Kennedy Space Center, Kings Bay Naval Submarine Base, Jekyll Island, Hunter Army Airfield and Savannah, Georgia. We are now in Charleston, South Carolina. I want to post some pictures of some of those visits, starting with Jekyll Island.

Jekyll Island was the original playground of the rich and famous. In the late 1800's, a group of wealthy businessmen formed the Jekyll Island Club as a winter retreat for America's most elite families. The club rolls included such names as Morgan, Astor, Rockefeller, Vanderbilt, Pulitzer, and others. On this small barrier island off the coast of southern Georgia, they built what they called "cottages" around a large Queen Anne style clubhouse. The men wanted a secluded place of isolation to hunt, fish and relax, and the women could carry on with their teas and such with others of their status. This famed Jekyll Island club featured stained glass, indoor plumbing, phone service, hardwood floors, and gas lighting at a time when very few people enjoyed such luxury. The first condo in the USA was built here in 1896 and featured 6 apartments to be sold.

This is the original small island church, and I believe is the one where John Kennedy Jr. was married.

This is the Jekyll Island Clubhouse, now transformed into a hotel. The club property boasted indoor tennis courts, the first in the nation. This is the view of the club as seen from the William Rockefeller 14,000 square foot cottage. John Rockefeller had put his name on the list as a partner to begin with, but when he saw his brother's name on the list, John decided to take his name off the list. Why pay for a membership when he could visit his brother and partake of everything for free!

I don't remember who built this cottage, but I like it very much. It kind of looked like an Italian villa. It looks like it would have been a nice house to raise my seven kids in!