Gulf Islands National Seashore - Almost nailed it.

Part of my six week tour involved moving my daughter from one Florida gulf coast city to another. After getting her packed and on a truck, I took a rainy, late night drive past one of the most untouched beaches I've ever seen. Sorry...No photos.... It was pretty damn eerie, all alone in the dark and not 100% sure the road was fully accessible. Water and sand on the road kept my speed down to about 15 MPH and my fingers cramping on the steering wheel.  I was driving through the Gulf Islands National Seashore between Fort Walton Beach and Pensacola Beach.



In the morning I took an early morning drive past another protected beach west of Pensacola,  Not as big, a little easier to access, nice morning light, and certainly as pristine. There are few places to stop and one was completely underwater and full of sand. Even the road had sand washed acrossed it. Pretty much all the foot traffic I encountered was confined to a few narrow strips. This is definitely the road less traveled.



The beauty was indescribable. Mostly because I could not fit it in my camera in any appreciable way. During my near dark drive I encountered sand dunes four stories tall but no way to capture them except my memories. Not only that, I was sort of afraid I would lose total sight of the sand covered road in the dark and spend the night stuck in one of those beautiful dunes. The morning beach did not have huge white dunes but still interesting.



These beaches are completely left to nature. No one flattens them, scrapes them clean, disrupts them in any way, or sticks a hundred miles of hotels and condos on them like where I'm from. Well, except for the occasional remnants of a few centuries of war.



Yes that is a huge gun. They are all over the place messing up the nature. That's why I was pleased to see nature fighting back and taking over one of the few parking places. You go nature!



I had high hopes of capturing magazine quality photos. Week two of my quest to capture nature and still not feeling it. I have the rest of the best on my Flickr account. See what you think.

  [click here]