St Simons Island, GA

After leaving Savannah, we drove to St Simons Island for the shipping conference Audra was attending. We spent the next couple of days on SSI. We had stayed at the King and Prince Beach & Golf Resort before. (You can see one of the first blogs was about St Simons Island and the King & Prince Resort.) Although the concept of PWGT had been conceived a long time before, The King and Prince is the official birth place of PlacesWeGoTravel.com. It was at this resort, two years ago, that I made the leap to finally get this blog started. Check out the archives on our first trip to King & Prince.

The King & Prince is a beautiful resort and always accommodative. https://www.kingandprince.com

Iguana’s Seafood Restaurant

After the meet ‘n greet, I met up with Audra and a friend from Springfield for oysters. (Sorry, we were pre-occupied with getting caught up that we were in the middle of our oysters that I forgot to take photos. Next time, I promise.) You can check out the archived first posts for a review of Iguana’s with photos. http://www.iguanasseafood.com

Pelican Market

On my first trip to the Golden Isles, I stopped in at a local coffee shop near the King and Prince. It was a combination coffee shop/souvenir shop/convenience store/hangout. They let me hang out and work from there for a little while as I was creating the blog. When I am in the area I always stop by for coffee and to say hi.

This time, their espresso machine had just went out the day before. The repair parts were on their way. They were making do with a much smaller capacity household machine. It worked! This is dubbed The Best Americano EVER! It did it’s job; it got me started for the day.

@pelicanmarketssi 

Sandcastle Café & Grille

I stopped at the Sandcastle Café & Grill for a quick breakfast before heading out for my adventures for the day. Last time I was there, I didn’t have time to try the Sandcastle Cafe, so that was on the agenda this time. It was good. I had the Oivey, which was cold smoked salmon, bagel and capers. Next trip, I will try their lunch. https://sandcastlessi.com

St Simons Island Pier

St Simons Island Pier is always a fun place to hang out.There is a lot to take in on the pier. Fisherman line the walkway. Birds are almost always perched all around. Gulls trying to steal a meal from a fisherman. Of course, the Golden Ray clean up. I have not (yet) fished off the pier, I will some time.

Artists on the Pier

I was working on a project for my Analog Photography class at Missouri State University. The project was to try to emulate the photographer that our professor assigned for our research project before midterms. I was assigned Alfred Stieglitz.

Stieglitz is considered the father of photography in the United States. Long story short, after his wife refused to support his photographic interests, he began an affair with a young art student. She became the subject of his work over the next several years. He photographer her hands, face, legs, and eventfully her full body. He displayed his work in his gallery in NYC. This was the first time nude images had been publicly displayed. Even though they were very tasteful and not vulgar, they created a hysteria of negative criticism and cries for censorship. His model’s name was Georgia O’Keeffe.

How do I try to replicate Stieglitz’s work? I didn’t think that a nude model would go over too well (with Audra or my professor 😏), so I decided to focused my project on just hands. I had some help from my awesome co-workers, but I needed more variety.

By happenstance, I met two beautiful ladies who were painting portraits on the pier. I thought this would be a great opportunity to capture some photographs for my project. I could focus on the artist AND their hands at work. I introduced myself and told them my project. I asked if I could photograph them at work. They were gracious enough to allow me to photograph them at work for my Hands photographic project. I took some digitals of them as well. Here are a few of those photographs of Alyson and Karen at work, painting on SSI Pier.

Here is Alyson Tucker‘s link. You can email Karen for details on her work. kkeen233@gmail.com

Old Friends

Having been in the international shipping industry, humanitarian relief more specifically, I knew many of the attendees at the conference that Audra came out for. We were able to hook up with some old dear friends for dinner while we were there. It is always great to see these friends! We met for dinner and then drove across the road for hand dipped local made ice cream.

I used to work for Missionary Expediters & Cargo Logistics which is headquartered out of New Orleans, Louisiana. Prior to my employment with them, I was a customer when I worked for a non-profit organization called Africa Tabernacle Evangelism. We shipped countless containers of building materials for churches to several countries across the continent. 

It is always great to catch up with old friends and meet new ones!

We had dinner and dessert with Jack, Denise, and Ronnie from MX and my old friend from Convoy of Hope, Kevin Rose. It is always great to catch up with old friends and meet new ones!

Dinner was at Del Sur Artisan Eats. Del Sur is an Italian Steakhouse that offers honest food and using homegrown herbs and vegetables. Our appetizer was a mixture of Caprese, Argentinian Sausage w/ Chimichurri, and Empanadas. Audra had the Butternut Squash Risotto and I had the Ribeye (extremely rare, of course) with linguini and pesto. Dessert was at Moo Cow Ice Cream. They offer hormone-free and house-churned ice cream. Our ice cream, it was melting so we had to start on it quickly. Sorry, no pics. ALL WAS FABULOUS!

Del Sur St Simons Island

Moo Cow Ice Cream

Relaxing

Blogging can be exhausting. We needed some relaxing time in the hot tub.

…with wine, of course!

St Simons Island Lighthouse

The St Simons Island Lighthouse is a historic landmark that is always intriguing to see. It is only one of five remaining working lighthouses on the Georgia Coast. I love photographing this lighthouse and it will always be a subject of at least one photo shoot every time I am on SSI. Many local artists have painted many portraits here. The outside is always crispy and clean. It photographs beautifully.

The lighthouse has an interesting past. The original lighthouse was an octagon shaped structure that was 75′ high. However, it was destroyed as part of a defensive move of the Confederate Army just prior to retreating as the Union Army was advancing on Brunswick during the Civil War in 1862. Ten years later it was rebuilt as a circular structure and increased to 104′.

SSI Lighthouse History

Jefecitas Mobile Kitchen

The conference Audra was attending was with MAP International in Brunswick. I stopped by MAP International to say hello to some other former colleagues. Timing was great because the food truck was still there. Jefectitas Street Tacos…

Jefecitas Mobile Kitchen

MAP International

So long SSI…

The conference was over so we had made plans to stay on Jekyll Island for a couple of days before heading back to Savannah to catch our flight home. St Simons Island is always a fun time. Lots to see, always great food. There are still a few places we haven’t tried. Next time… So long SSI, until our next visit.