New Year's Eve

Yesterday we drove to the Picnic Area and then walked along the beach to Fort Macon.  It was a beautiful, warm afternoon, and children and dogs were playing with equal exuberance down on the beach.  Martha spotted a dolphin out in the surf, leaping out of the water as exuberantly as those on shore.  And someone had written this in the sand near the Fort.  

We returned to the Picnic Area on the Elliott Coues Nature Trail, which winds through the maritime forest and then climbs up on the high sand dunes overlooking the beach.  It was a good day for a hike, and we covered about four miles in all.

This morning, I accomplished a goal I had been tentatively eyeing for a few days.  I realized that all I needed was a six-mile run to bring my total annual miles to exactly 800, more than in each of the past two years.  I like round numbers.  And I wanted to end this long, depressing, anxious year on a high note.  It turned out to be a perfect day and I accomplished this modest goal.  We have evolved some traditions over the years, and one of them for me is to total up my annual mileage and add it to the spreadsheet that I have maintained for the past 25 years.  I realize this sounds a little obsessive-compulsive, but it is somehow encouraging to see my cumulative mileage increase each year (31,352 as of today).

Another tradition we have is to read back all of the things we have been writing on the little blackboard in our kitchen during the year.  It is a way of remembering, of reviewing the sadness and the joy, the inspirational things we said to one another week after week, as we put an end to one year and begin another. 

Was 2020 the annus horribilis some are saying it was?  I read that in 1992, during a year-end address marking the 40th anniversary of her ascendancy to the throne of England, the queen famously said, “1992 is not a year on which I shall look back with undiluted pleasure.”  That sums up 2020 pretty well.  But with a Covid vaccine on the horizon, we are optimistic about the future. 

To all the readers of this blog, we wish you a Happy New Year and a less horrible 2021!

For auld lang syne, my dear
For auld lang syne
We'll take a cup o' kindness yet
For auld lang syne.

The NC Aquarium at Pine Knoll Shores

One of the three aquariums in North Carolina is located on a large piece of property in Pine Knoll Shores, less than 15 minutes down Highway 58.  We have been there more than once in past years, and Sunday afternoon was a good day for a return visit, with bright blue skies and not many visitors.  We made the mistake of coming on Martin Luther King’s birthday one year and found ourselves nearly tripping over hundreds of excited children underfoot.

I may not be as excitable as those children were, but I do enjoy wandering slowly through an aquarium, especially this one, which leads the visitor through the different types of waters in North Carolina beginning with the mountains and its lakes and rivers.  In well-designed tanks we saw brown trout and bass and minnows that one might find in the Cullasaja River or one of our mountain lakes.  A high waterfall cascades down the middle of the mountain room, reminding us of Bridal Veil Falls, or perhaps Rainbow Falls in the Great Smoky Mountains.

There was even a very popular exhibit of river otters.  Is there a more energetic and playful mammal anywhere?  Only kittens and puppies come to mind.  They seemed to be enjoying putting on a show in front of wide-eyed children and adults alike.  My newly-discovered ability to post videos to this blog has not been perfected but may work well enough.

 We have to wonder as we gaze out the condo at that bright gleaming ocean in front of us each day about the incredible variety of life under the surface.  Sometimes a dolphin will arc into the air, and sometimes an interesting creature will wash up on shore, and sometimes we will see pelicans dive down, or seagulls swirl around a school of fish.  And of course the fishing boats pass back and forth with their nets dragging deep in the ocean.  But the depths of the ocean are a mysterious place to us, filled with strange creatures, and aquariums like this one provide a window into that other world.

There were seahorses, and long diaphanous creatures I had never seen before, and stingrays, too, which visitors were normally allowed to touch as they circled round and round in a big tank; but it was closed today and I couldn’t help wondering if stingrays were susceptible to the Covid virus.  My photos of the seahorses did not come out well in the dim light, but Martha's did.

And this photo of a lionfish shows just how strange some of these creatures of the deep can appear.

There were turtles and snakes and even a small caiman.  This big loggerhead turtle would  be a clumsy creature on land, but in his natural element he was weightless and graceful.

One of the best exhibits they have here is a huge L-shaped tank in which there is a shipwreck, and it is teeming with fish, some of them big.  In the past, we have seen scuba divers down there, looking out the tank at fascinated children gathered all along it, but this was not a busy day and there were few children.  Still, we saw barracudas, and one menacing-looking nurse shark slowly making his way through the crowd.  It seemed as if the other fish were more than happy to get out of his way, and I wondered what would prevent a shark from attacking one of the smaller fish.  Perhaps they only stock the tank with species that are unappetizing to the bigger predators.

I hope readers of this blog can view these videos.  Because that is what is especially fascinating to me, the way these fish keep moving relentlessly, gracefully, unhurriedly through the water.  I learned that the saying that sharks must keep swimming or they will die is actually not true, but you would never know it from watching this nurse shark circling and circling, and never seeming to need to sleep.

One thing we especially wanted to see were the moon jellies, which we have been seeing washed up on the beach this winter.  They are a beautiful sight even in their death, glistening and translucent, but they can sting when they are alive, although their sting is not as dangerous as the Portuguese Man-of-War; we saw some of them on this beach last September but they disappear in the colder months.

Like the loggerhead turtles, the moon jellies are in their element here, dancing in a ghostly and graceful ballet which is a little mesmerizing to watch.

When we finished seeing most of the aquarium, we went outside onto the marsh boardwalk, which turns into the Alice Hoffman Nature Trail.  There is a good venomous snake exhibit off the boardwalk in a separate building, perhaps because they might terrify some of the younger children (they give some of the adults the creeps, too).  I don’t think I have ever seen a diamondback rattlesnake as large as the one on display there.  And it never fails to give me a start to see how well a copperhead can camouflage itself; I would step on one before I ever saw it.

At one end of the front parking lot there is another fine trail, the Theodore Roosevelt Nature Trail.  There was plenty of time before the gates would close so we hiked its entire length then backtracked, passing only a few people along the way.  The trail climbs up onto some surprisingly steep sand dunes and into a maritime forest.  It felt good to be out in the woods hiking, one of our favorite things to do.

There were some very nice salt marsh ponds, too, and from one Martha spotted a large blue heron rising rapidly from the water and winging out of sight, too fast for my slow camera.

Late December was a good time of year to be hiking along these marshes, we decided, which in the summer would be packed with hikers and might also be a little snaky.  And I remembered that the gnats and mosquitoes were especially bad last September.  We saw this sign as we neared the end of the trail, a reminder of what awaits the unprepared hiker (i.e., one not slathered in insect repellent) in July.

“Prefer to bite herbivores or birds rather than people."  Right.  That is a relief to learn.  Only apply DEET when not in proximity to herbivores and birds.

Boxing Day

As predicted, it snowed on Christmas morning in Highlands, the first White Christmas since 2010.  Part of me wanted to be there to see it, because according to the photos on Facebook, it was one of those magical snows that clings to everything, transforming the natural world into something from a Christmas card.  The temperatures reportedly dropped into single digits and it did not look like anybody was out on Main Street.

We had a very nice Christmas and we hope that all of the readers of this blog had the same.  We looked out the balcony and, believe it or not, saw three ships sailing in – big freighters anchored off Beaufort Inlet. 

I saw three ships come sailing in
On Christmas Day, on Christmas Day;
I saw three ships come sailing in
On Christmas Day in the morning.

By this morning only one remained out on the horizon.  Martha looked through the binoculars and swears that there was a huge snowman on the rear deck of one of them.  My vision is not as good as hers, but it did look like something tall and white, either cranes for unloading cargo, the rough surf making big whitecaps against the hull, or a crew with a sense of humor and the biggest inflatable decoration that I have ever seen.

Overnight it turned even colder, 12 degrees in Highlands, 29 degrees here with a wind chill of 18.  My Tai Chi on the dune-top deck was completed expeditiously. 

Today is Boxing Day, I learned from my news feed.  When we traveled to London 15 years ago, we arrived on Boxing Day and I remember that there were crowds of people everywhere.  Now it has become a holiday here, too.  I learned from a CNN report that it originated as a day of giving:

“Way back during the Victorian era in Britain, servants were allowed time off to visit their families on December 26, since they had to work for their employers' Christmas Day celebrations. It became such a standard practice that in 1871, a new holiday was born. Some say it stems from when the wealthy would give boxes filled with small gifts, money, and Christmas leftovers to their employees to recognize their service. Another theory is that churches put out boxes for people to give money to the poor, and the money was distributed the day after Christmas.”

A century and a half later, there is still poverty everywhere.  But as with most things about this holiday, Boxing Day has been commercialized so that it is now a shopping day comparable to Black Friday.  We celebrated Boxing Day by not going anywhere this morning and definitely not doing any shopping.  After a lunch of turkey sandwiches, I found a couple of lovely performances of The Nutcracker on PBS and watched them, one by the UNC School of the Arts and one by the Scranton Civic Ballet Company.  They were described as “for our time,” but still it was a little jarring to see all of the dancers wearing face masks.

After a brisk walk around the block and out onto the beach, I returned to watch a performance of Handel's Messiah by the Handel and Hayden Society in Boston - a Messiah "for out time."  And yes, they, too, were wearing masks. 

Martha talked to two of her aunts yesterday and discovered that Anne will be having her first Covid vaccine next week, and Lizette will be having hers in the near future, too.  As for the rest of us, we will just wait patiently as those who need it the most are protected first.  But it is hopeful as we end this year and begin another one.  Can we actually begin to look forward to a time when we can once again dine in restaurants with friends, visit relatives who have been in quarantine since March, travel and not be afraid to stay in a hotel room?  Will we be able to dance?  And make music?  Without wearing masks?

Every valley shall be exalted,
and every mountain and hill made low;
the crooked straight and the rough places plain.

Christmas at the Beach

This is the first year we have ever spent Christmas at the beach.  But everything is different this year and it was a good decision for us to come here earlier than usual.  Only one year ago, Martha’s Mama was still alive and her house was decorated thoroughly, as it was for all the seasons and holidays she enjoyed.  We attended the candlelight service at the First Presbyterian Church in Highlands, something we have rarely missed in nearly 40 years, and were in our own home the next morning.  It is hard to believe that only a year ago church services were real, not virtual, in those times before a pandemic took over our lives.

We have adjusted well to staying in this condo facing the ocean, watching the moon and the tides and the Great Conjunction, and running and hiking much more than we would be doing in Highlands.  Martha has decorated the place nicely, mostly from the Dollar Tree just down the road, and we even have a tree in the corner and some humble presents awaiting Christmas morning.  And tomorrow morning we will begin preparing Christmas Dinner – turkey, dressing, rice, gravy, maple-glazed broccoli and sweet potatoes, and cranberry sauce.

Yesterday afternoon we drove down the Crystal Coast all the way to Swansboro, looking at Christmas lights on the way back.  Before we had gotten very far, we spotted this beautiful egret, a not uncommon sight out here, standing right along the side of the road next to the salt marsh that backs up on Amos Mosquito restaurant.  I stopped and honked the horn, hoping to see him rise into the air on those huge wings they have, but that did not faze him, nor did he mind us taking as many photos as we liked.

It was a quiet drive on two-lane Highway 58 with little traffic, through Pine Knoll Shore, Salter Path, Indian Beach, and Emerald Isle, and then across two bridges to Swansboro.  We have always enjoyed Swansboro, and in the past we would have driven down for the day, eaten lunch somewhere, and wandered around looking at the historic homes.  But times are different, so we simply drove down to the marina and watched the sunset, brown pelicans winging back and forth across the sunset. 

I have been running harder than usual this week, taking advantage of the good weather – and five miles on Monday and a set of intervals on Wednesday.  Low tide has come round again in the mornings, so I ran back from the picnic area on the beach.  I almost missed this perfect sand dollar in the calm surf, just washed in.  We have only found pieces of them before, but this one was unbroken and whole, a Christmas gift from the Atlantic.

This good day just past low tide
By the calm and shining ocean on a bed of shells,
I found this sand dollar, still pink and trembling,
Washed in on the tide, proof positive,
Whole and undefiled, and I carried it
Carefully back home for you to see,
Cradling it newborn in my faithless hand,
Afraid to blow off the sand lest I break it.

I had planned to take a rest day today, but the weather has turned remarkably balmy ahead of a quickly moving snowstorm, which is predicted to bring snow to Highlands for Christmas morning.  It has been a long time since there has been a White Christmas!  Here, it was 68 degrees, and there was a stiff offshore breeze, so strong that it was blowing mounds of sea foam all along the breaking waves, where it lay quivering as if it was alive.  Little balls of foam would detach themselves and roll wildly across the sand like tumbleweeds, disappearing in the wind and sand.

 We are so fortunate that through the generosity of Martha’s Aunt Lizette we can escape the worst part of the winter, running and hiking and being out of doors here nearly every day.  I have run in snow and ice and sub-freezing temperatures for years in the winter, but the older I am the more difficult it becomes.  And we are fortunate, too, that we can be happy here at Christmas as well as anywhere, because we are at home wherever we are together.  As Mariah Carey sings, All I want for Christmas is you.

Now Christmas Eve is approaching as I write in this blog, gazing out the balcony doors at the ocean, partway open on this still-balmy afternoon.  I will find some Christmas music to play – Carols, The Nutcracker, and then later Messiah.  And we will give thanks for all that we have.  I always remember that lovely quote that Shakespeare has Marcellus say in Hamlet this time of year. 

Some say that ever, 'gainst that season comes
Wherein our Saviour's birth is celebrated,
The bird of dawning singeth all night long;
And then, they say, no spirit dare stir abroad,
The nights are wholesome, then no planets strike,
No fairy takes, nor witch hath power to charm,
So hallow'd and so gracious is the time. 

So to the readers of this blog we wish a Merry Christmas in this hallow’d and gracious time of year.

The Great Conjunction

Perched on the edge of the Atlantic Ocean, we see much more of the sky than from our valley in Clear Creek.  So on this Winter Solstice evening we knew that it would be a good place to view the Great Conjunction, a phenomenon that occurs when Jupiter and Saturn appear in close proximity in the sky just after sunset.  We had been reading about this phenomenon for several weeks and had hoped it would be a clear night, and last night it was just perfect.  The sky had been overcast earlier in the afternoon, but as sunset approached it all cleared out like an audience leaving a theater, leaving the stage empty and the curtains drawn open.

The last time these two planets appeared so close together was 397 years ago, on July 16, 1623.  The two planets have been there in the western sky for several days now, closing in on one another (although actually millions of miles apart), and our daughter and her boyfriend, who have a very good telescope, were able to see the moons of Jupiter and the rings of Saturn.  He took this photo a couple of days ago.

We did not expect to see Saturn’s rings, even with our Bushnell 7 X 50 binoculars; they’re great for bird-watching and dolphin-watching but not for planet-watching.  But we excitedly went out on the dune-top deck just after sunrise, a beautiful time of evening, and were glad to be there even if we did not see the two planets.

I gazed upward through the binoculars at the quarter moon dangling directly overhead like an ornament.  It was waxing and will be full on December 29, and if that night is as clear as last night, you will be able to see clearly all around from this dune-top deck, the dune vegetation glowing in beautiful blue moonlight.

The afterglow was still beautiful in the western sky.  Off to the east, I could see clearly through my binoculars what I have been seeing every morning when I do my Tai Chi and wondering about – an anchor decoration outlined with blue lights in the window of the neighboring house.  Our own balcony lights looked cheery behind us, and we could see two or three Christmas trees showing through the open drapes of some of the condo units.  A lot of families have begun to arrive this week, either to escape the pandemic or perhaps part of a long-standing tradition to come to the beach for Christmas.

Martha spotted it first, just a few degrees above the horizon, a double star that looked to the naked eye like a single bright star.  I tried to take a photo through the binoculars.

My daughter took this photo - much better!

It was an amazing sight to see, and we lingered for a long time gazing at it, trying to take better photos, before finally returning to the condo for dinner.  One of Martha’s Facebook friends later sent her this photo taken from the Blue Ridge Parkway, which would have been just as good a place to view it as here.  It was taken by Wayne Howard, and was taken, he said, with a 500 mm Canon with the IDX UV filter off.  He referred to it as the Star of Bethlehem.

It does look like the Star of Bethlehem one sees on Christmas cards this time of year.  Two of the ten cards we have received so far this year have stars depicted that look just like this.  Did this conjunction really appear at the time Jesus was born, I wondered?  One website said this: 

Some have suggested that these two planets might be a replica of the legendary Star of Bethlehem.  Actually, one of the more popular theories for the "Christmas Star" was a series of conjunctions between Jupiter and Saturn in 7 BC.  For in that year Jupiter and Saturn met not once but three times that year (in May, September and December).  The first conjunction (on May 29, visible "in the east" before sunrise) presumably started the Magi on their way to Bethlehem from the Far East.  The middle conjunction (September 30) may have strengthened their resolve in the purpose of their journey, while the third and final conjunction (Dec. 5) occurred just as they arrived in Judea to meet with King Herod, who sent them on to Bethlehem to "go and search diligently for the young child." 

It may be fanciful to imagine this (but we can be fanciful at Christmas time, can’t we?), but the music from Amahl and the Night Visitors was still echoing in my head, and it made me wonder if the three Magi had stopped at the humble dwelling of a widow woman and a crippled boy during their journey.  Menotti described it beautifully as Amahl tells his mother what was keeping him outside while she was calling him:

Oh mother! You should go out and see!
There’s never been such a sky.
Damp clouds have shined it,
and soft winds have swept it,
as if to make it ready for a king’s ball.
All its lanterns are lit,
all its torches are burning,
and its dark floor is shining like crystal.
Hanging over our roof,
there is a star as large as a window;
and the star has a tail, and it moves
across the sky like a chariot on fire.

Amahl and the Night Visitors

One of the things I have always enjoyed about Christmas is the classical music that becomes available.  Handel’s Messiah is a perennial favorite, and we have seen many live performances over the years.  My Dad was an organist and choir director in several churches over the years, and I vividly remember a performance at the Hamden Plains Methodist Church in Connecticut where he served during the 1950s and 1960s.  It was a small but very talented choir, and I listened to them practice week after week from the balcony of the church; this would take place on Friday evenings after Junior Choir (to which I belonged) had finished rehearsing.  The Christmas portion of Messiah is burned deep in my memory.

Then there is Bach.  Not too many years ago, we drove to Asheville and saw an excellent performance of J. S. Bach’s Christmas Oratorio.  Other favorites by Bach that I enjoy this time of year are the Cantata Sleepers Wake (BWV 140) and the Magnificat (BWV 243), which I urge readers of this blog to find on YouTube.  There are some particularly fine performances by the Netherlands Bach Society.

I also grew up listening to another Christmas classic, Amahl and the Night Visitors, by Gian Carlo Menotti.  It was the first opera commissioned for television and was shown for many years on NBC beginning in 1951.  Martha and I saw a memorable performance in All Souls Church in Biltmore a few decades ago.  And my daughter and I drove to Asheville for several years to take in the lovely annual performances by the Asheville Lyric Opera in Thomas Wolfe Auditorium, something of a tradition for us.  I am thinking that it finally came to an end when the boy soprano’s voice changed (as mine did when I was in the Junior Choir).  It is truly a wonderful piece of music, and I found an especially good performance on YouTube by the Ash Lawn Opera of Charlottesville, VA and listened to it this afternoon, a rainy and gloomy day in Atlantic Beach.  The libretto is pure poetry:

Oh woman, you may keep the gold.
The child we seek doesn’t need our gold.
On love, on love alone he will build his kingdom.
His pierced hand will hold no scepter.
His haloed head will wear no crown.
His might will not be built on your toil.
Swifter than lightning,
He will soon walk among us.
He will bring us new life,
And receive our death,
And the keys to his city belong to the poor.

It is a touching story, and one that I never tire of seeing.  And the music is wonderful, too, filled with melodies from the Mideast and tight three-part harmonies between the three kings, the "night visitors."  I learned today that Menotti based the opera on his childhood memories of Christmas in Italy.

This is an opera for children because it tries to recapture my own childhood. You see, when I was a child I lived in Italy, and in Italy we have no Santa Claus. I suppose that Santa Claus is much too busy with American children to be able to handle Italian children as well. Our gifts were brought to us by the Three Kings, instead.

I am so thankful that Handel and Bach and Menotti left these beautiful pieces of music for us to enjoy.  And that none of them knew who Santa Claus was, wondered why Rudolph was never included in any "Reindeer Games," or wondered what kind of magic resided in Frosty's old top hat.

Christmas Displays

Martha’s aunt Lizette told us about Harkers Island when we first started coming here, but I’m not sure she ever came during the Christmas season.  We told ourselves last week that we wanted to drive out there again at night to see the Christmas lights display, and last night was a perfect time to do so.  We left well before sunset thinking there might be bumper-to-bumper traffic as there had been at the Newport display two weeks ago, but the roads were nearly deserted.  It was a beautiful time of evening with a gorgeous sunset behind us as we drove.  I stopped to take this picture at the little marina where shrimpers are always docked.

 
As we arrived at Harkers Island itself, the sunset in the west continued lighting up the sky, orange and then red all along the horizon.  It was absolutely beautiful.  Pickup trucks were parked along Back Sound; folks had driven out simply to watch, and we joined them there.  It seemed to linger forever, even after the sun had finally disappeared, lighting up the clouds along the horizon for what seemed like an hour.  

Had the Christmas lights been disappointing, we would have been satisfied with this display we were watching.  But they were not disappointing at all.  We have always enjoyed this simple pleasure of driving out and looking at lights in Highlands.  We knew where all of the best displays were, and by best I mean not necessary the largest display, but sometimes a simple, tasteful display.  On the road between Asheville and Highlands for many years, there seemed to be a friendly competition between two or three houses.  I still remember that one house had everything out on the lawn:  Mary and Joseph and the Baby Jesus in the front yard, Santa and his reindeer on the roof, Frosty by the driveway, and even the Grinch.  They had all the bases covered!  But just down the road there might be a house with a single simple candle in every window, which was even more lovely.

Christmas trees originated in Germany when folks started bringing these holdover from pagan times inside their homes and decorating them, and it is probably true that Martin Luther first added lighted candles to the tree.  (That sounds like a pretty dangerous combination to me.)  When electric lights came along, our modern strings of lights were used, the kind that most of us grew up with.  Martha remembers them, too, and how bulbs would burn out and have to be replaced, or perhaps someone in the family had the “magic touch” and could tap it and it would come back on again.  I am thinking lights escaped into the yard in a kind of Christmas sprawl, sometimes just thrown loosely over the boxwoods out front, sometimes climbing up trees and railings onto the roof.  The most spectacular display we saw, as is so often the case, was in front of this humble single-wide trailer.

Clark Griswold would have been proud!  Some of the other displays were more subdued, and some consisted of simply wreaths and red ribbons.

 

The most popular decoration out here was this anchor, which every home seemed to have in their front yards.

Nearly every home along the road was decorated in some way.  Not only did these residents take pride in their homes, but their displays said something about them, too.  You could tell that some of the decorations went back years and years, tall plastic candles along the front door railings lovingly maintained, and in one yard a red lantern like the kind the Town of Highlands used to hang from the utility poles on Main Street.

The drive back was a challenge for Martha, who had agreed to take the after-dark shift because her night vision is better than mine.  Now that it was truly dark, the road ahead was filled with vehicles approaching, most of them those huge pickup trucks they have out here with blinding lights.  We were glad to cross the bridge and return to the snug condo, where in no time we had our own modest lights going, on the tiny tree and on the balcony, facing the ocean and visible to nobody except us inside and those who might be out on the walkway at night.

Our lights have been noticed by some, though, and they have commented on them.  This morning I awoke early, before sunrise, for my Tai Chi.  I had gone just a few steps on the walkway when I realized it was slick with ice; I turned and gingerly tip-toed back down, and at the same time a woman and her little dog emerged from the building.  “Ah, you beat me out here this morning!” she said. 

“Careful,” I warned her, “That walkway is very slick!” 

“Oh, I’m just going out on the grass,” she said.  “Are you a new owner?”  I explained that we were staying in Martha’s aunt’s condo, escaping a colder climate.  “Are you the ones with the pretty Christmas lights?” she asked, and gestured up above to our balcony.

“Yes, that’s us.”  Then she chuckled a little and said, “I call you the Tai Chi man!”  I thought that was funny.  And a little unnerving that she might be watching me every morning out on the dune-top deck. 

The Tai Chi man!  Out there on display for everyone to see.

Dredging and Nourishing

The past two weeks, when I have been running my so-called “Picnic Area intervals,” I have noticed that equipment was being moved into place in the parking lot.  After a one-mile warm-up, I have been sprinting from the “Yield” sign at one end of the parking lot to the trash can at the other, about one-eighth of a mile, then resting and sprinting back again.  Yesterday I was pleased that, despite a stiff wind blowing, my fastest time was 1:01.  That is about the same time I ran last year, which is encouraging, and I remember that I finally even managed to get below one minute last year.  It is amazing how much a single second or two can mean to a runner!  It could mean the difference between qualifying for the Boston Marathon or not.

Yesterday, just like last week, I found my own private track blocked by traffic cones and two sections of tape.  Had I been a hurdler, I might have viewed this as a challenge and attempted to jump over, but instead I threaded my way through the middle, right down the double-yellow line. 

At the east end of the parking lot there was much activity.  Several vehicles and pieces of equipment had been moved in, and there were portable toilets set up as well as a temporary shed such as one sees on construction sites.  There were also two generators and a big diesel fuel tank in the opposite corner of the parking lot.  

Down on the beach near the jetty where we had walked a couple of weeks ago, there was a huge pile of rusty pipe, perhaps 40 or 50 lengths at that time, 20 feet long and about 24” in diameter.  I will post some photos of them next time I am walking on the beach.  A little research led me to discover that the sections of pipe will be assembled and connected to a pipeline dredge, part of an $18 million project called the Morehead City Harbor Dredging & Concurrent Beach Nourishment (2021).  Silt will be dredged from the Morehead City Harbor and deposited on this beach.  The city is a State Port and the deepest East Coast port, the destination for all of those freighters we see on the horizon.

A cutterhead-suction dredge utilizes a crane situated on a barge that positions the cutterhead, which looks like a gigantic drill bit, along the seafloor.  The cutterhead agitates the sandy bottom, and the resulting slurry of sediment and water is subsequently suctioned into a long tube transitioning into a pipeline that can be extended to a specific target area (beach, upland disposal site, etc.).  Pipeline dredges are usually not self-powered, but are towed to the dredging site and secured in place by special anchor pilings, called spuds.  The dredge has enough horsepower to pump the sand a maximum distance of approximately 4.25 miles extending from the channel westward close to the Atlantic Beach Circle.     

A truly wonderful Beach Nourishment Base Map was provided on the website, indicating white areas that will gradually be colored in red as the project moves forward.

I thoroughly enjoy sitting on the dune-top deck here, watching brown pelicans glide by on motionless wings, and the distant glistening arcs of dolphins out on the ocean some days, and all of the other parts of this natural world. 

Time has its own rules out here.
The hours come and go like the tide,
Rising and falling all day long,
Leaving moon jellies behind on the sand.

I also thoroughly enjoy watching work like this take place, a testament to human ingenuity and science, to skilled labor and complicated engineering yoked together, moving huge quantities of sand through a pipe and depositing it on a beach miles away.  It reminds me that we Americans are, after all, the same people who had the audacious courage to send a man to the moon and bring him back home again.  And to build the engineering marvels that we take for granted every day, from power dams to skyscrapers to jet aircraft.   

At our best, we are capable of achieving great things!