Got back last night from a pleasant weekend in Hilton Head.
Mark Russom is down here for a little over a week. It only seemed natural that we would all fly out to Hilton Head to get in some golf. So on Saturday morning we took a Piper Warrior and headed out. We had great tail winds with the GPS showing our ground speed at up to 156 knots on the leg between the Dublin VOR and Hilton Head. The trip only took about one hour and a half.
This is the second time I’ve visited the Carolina Air Center FBO and the second time I’ve come away incredibly impressed with their friendliness and extraordinary customer service. Special thanks to Jennifer who patiently answered all my questions and arranged for our rental car, and to Mike who gave us a great “lay of the land” and highlighted a bunch of options that we could pursue on the island.
Hilton Head can be a hard place to navigate around, between all the private “plantations” (I’m not at all convinced that gated communities are even legal) to the obscure access to the beaches (all the beaches are “public” by the way – it’s just finding a way to get to them). But armed with the information above plus some golf reservations we knew where we were going and had no problem doing what we wanted.
Mark and I golfed at the Sea Pines – Ocean Course . This was a very nice course. We had absolutely nobody in front of us or pressuring us from behind. I suppose the 9o degree plus temperatures and 2:30 tee time may have had something to do with that :).
I had not used a GPS-equipped golf cart before either, it was really nice knowing exactly where I was in relation to the tee as well as exactly how well (or poorly) I was hitting. I can’t believe how pervasive this technology is becoming, and I mean that in the very best way!
Michelle went for a walk through the plantation and out into the “Public” area of the island. Shopping and fingering her VISA card every time something caught her eye. But restraint ruled the day (that and our luggage limit in the airplane) and I’m not sure if she ended up buying anything at all.
Timing worked out perfectly and Michelle strolled over to meet us at the 18th hole green. We then hit the hotel and headed out for dinner.
The next day we rented some bikes from “Pedals”. At $10/24 hours they were half the price of the bicycle rental place at the golf course. We took the bikes down to the beach and rode along the hard packed sand as far as we could go to the North (there is an inlet there that we didn’t feel like fording).
We grabbed a bite at the waterfront restaurant of the Marriott and then headed out onto the streets to try to make our way back to drop off the bikes. The tide had come in and we didn’t have that great sand to ride on any more.
Got to the airport by about 5 pm Sunday, used their Wi-Fi to check weather and other flight details and then headed back for Atlanta. The great tailwind that had sped us on our way to Hilton Head was now slightly diminished and was now a headwind that greatly slowed us down heading home. But about two hours and forty five minutes later we touched down at Briscoe field and then headed out for a late supper at Applebees.