"Let the waves hit your feet, and the sand be your seat." -- Unknown

Myrtle Beach State Park. Anytime I see these over-sized chairs I think of the show laugh-in, "and that's the truth!"

The moderate temperatures and the beach are so enjoyable. I can easily say the beach, wherever it might be, is my happy place. We also are enjoying being stable, even if it's only for a month. Doesn't seem like nearly 2 weeks have gone by already. 

We have been cooking and walking. Sunday night was delicious Slow Cooker Chicken Crack.  Pat threw it in the crock pot and we headed for a 4.5 mile walk on the beach. We went southish to where the water prevented those who wouldn't take off their shoes (Pat) from crossing. Then we headed the other way, northish, towards Myrtle Beach State Park. But, we kept going. We made it to a long stretch of condos, hotel rooms, or apartments, not sure which. After dinner we made cookies, oatmeal/pecan/dried cherries with dark chocolate chips added to half. Not all fun, we've gotten a lot of projects done too.

What we have been enjoying on the beach:

A little windy, but we made it down one afternoon to read.

I haven't made it up early enough to look for shells, but I have heard others tell of finding big conch shells and massive clam shells. We often find pieces of shells like this that are 1/2" thick or more. 

Last Friday, following an inspection, the Renaissance tower was deemed structurally unsafe and people were given one hour to vacate.  Not sure if it had anything to do with Hurricane Ian or not. Not many details have been released. It is just to the South of us. Over the weekend we had a large sonic boom from military maneuvers off the coast and someone started the rumor that the tower had collapsed.

The Renaissance Tower in Myrtle Beach is  22 stories of condos. 

Still working on dune repairs. 

The airport is just on the other side of the state park and the planes are pretty low over the beach. 

The pier at the state park has lots of boards sitting there to repair the hurricane damage. It is closed but somehow this fisherman made it out there.

The ocean salt dries out the trees and causes parts of them to die.

Tracking the ocean currents with radar.

Towers past the state park. 

The pier at that end was open.

A schoolie from Canada. 
Where are the Piepers now? Pirateland Camping Resort, Myrtle Beach, SC

A big oops!

Do you know what this is a picture of?  More importantly do you know what would have caused this to happen?

The above picture reminds me of a kids magazine, maybe Highlights, where they had close up pictures and you had to figure out what the pictures were. The answer can be found below.

Pat says I'm "spring cleaning" but at least he didn't say I was "nesting!" I'm working my way around the RV cleaning cabinets and drawers. With as little space as we have you would think there wouldn't be much to do, but it's amazing how much stuff you can cram into a small space. I'm getting rid of the "useless" so we can find the important things. A lot of the things that are getting pitched are things that came from the house because they might be handy, but they weren't.

My brother asked me a while back something to the effect of what mistakes we may have made in our RV experience. The biggest one at the time was when Pat forgot to put the car in park before we unhooked. We were on a slight hill but Pat and a very nice neighbor stopped the car. 

Well when we left the temporary campground Mon. and moved to our current one, we (I say that because I'm not taking the entire blame) made a big mistake.  As we left Hideaway RV park, I drove the car into position to be hooked up to the RV, Pat hooked up the car, put the car in neutral and checked everything else in the car for the process of hooking-up. I checked lights, turn signals, and to make sure the tow bar was engaged before taking off. 50 feet later, from the office where we hooked up to the exit of the park, something was wrong! The parking brake was on in the car and we had been dragging it! We corrected it and proceeded to go 15 mins. to our current park, Pirateland.

Tues. we drove up to the office to pick-up some bigger packages and the car sounded like it had a flat tire. Pat gets out to look and both rear tires have a flat spit on one side of the tire (see picture above), ooops! I felt terrible because I never use the parking brake except, for some unknown reason, when I pull it up behind the RV.  However, when Pat is checking to make sure everything in the car is in tow mode he should be checking that too. To make matters worse Pat had wanted me to drive the car the short distance from one park to the other but I talked him into towing it. Either way I hope we make it the short distance to Costco Thurs. for new tires! Oh and I put a piece of blue tape over the parking brake handle and wrote "NO" on it.

New tires

Tape on the emergency brake so hopefully it doesn't happen again.

We took a nearly 3 mile round-trip walk on the beach Weds. morning to Myrtle Beach State Park. The temperature was in the low to mid 60's but with the sun shining brightly it felt warmer. In the afternoon we rode our bike around Pirateland, including to the office for another package. This was to avoid putting stress on our "square" tires.

We haven't seen a lot of hurricane damage fortunately. Steps crossing the dunes appeared to sustain damage in many places and dune damage itself.

Myrtle Beach Pier, in the background, had quite a bit of damage.

Thurs. we decided to go the other way on our beach walk. Pat didn't want to take his shoes off so we didn't get far.

Not crossing here.

By afternoon the water was working away at the beach on the other side of the rocks.  The RV Park next door was busy putting rocks and sand on the other end to prevent it from entering their park.

By afternoon the beach was pretty busy. In the summer I bet it gets crowded.

On many beaches you find shells. Apparently here, at least after hurricanes, they collect goggles.

They appear to be done with most of the sand removal but they were working on the causeway today.

Where are the Piepers now? Myrtle Beach, SC

"I cook with wine. Sometimes I even add it to the food." -- W. C. Fields

Sunday evening we took advantage of a free Facebook Food and Wine pairing class from Gia's Italian Kitchen in Cedar Rapids. What, you aren't in Cedar Rapids? Neither were we. We participated from Myrtle Beach. 

Gia's Italian Kitchen offers online cooking classes. They also offer online private group  and workplace team building instruction. Kelley Cole of Cedar Rapids is the owner and enthusiastic instructor. You can check out Kelley's web page, Gia's Italian Kitchen, and her you tube channel, for more information and instructional videos.

Kelley made it so easy. We received our detailed ingredient list and cooking guide ahead. During the class we could ask questions and have them answered on the live chat. There was minimal prep ahead because Kelley does the prep right along with you. 

I must say that Pat was our chef and I the sous chef. Dr. Steven Greif, sommelier, shared information on the wines we would be pairing with our dishes. It was so much fun and the food was great! OK, the wine was great too!

I had our ingredients and supplies ready.  

Preparing the Asparagus Tart with Goat Cheese and Oregano. We might have  started the wine tasting a little early.😉

The tart is in the oven and Pat is cooking the meatballs.

Doesn't that look fantastic? It tasted as good as it looked. 5 stars to Pat and our instructors!

Kelley Cole, owner of Gia's Italian Kitchen and Dr. Steven Greif, sommelier.

Classic Meatballs over Arugula, Asparagus Tart with Goat Cheese and Oregano, along with the recommended wines to pair with each dish.

Where are the Piepers now? Myrtle Beach

Lots of sand

On Monday they were still working on clearing the sand from the park and doing repairs. No park internet and some park amenities are still closed. 

We left Georgia Saturday. I wasn't able to reach our RV park, Pirateland in Myrtle Beach, by phone, email, or Facebook before we headed out. They hadn't updated their fate from Hurricane Ian on their web or Facebook page either. Pat didn't want to drive 350 miles not knowing if we had a place to stay or not, so we booked a site for 2 nights at a campground only 14 minutes from Pirateland, but away from the ocean.  

Turns out Pirateland did have problems from the storm surge Friday but most people could get to their sites by Sat. or Sun.

We have an ocean site, can't see it but it's a short walk.

One of the park's 4 causeways had damage.

An RV close to ours that had weathered the storm. Not sure if the water was this high on the trailer or just splashed up.

Lots of sand, mostly from the storm surge.  

We didn't have to walk over the dunes here!

We moved in Monday.  A cold day with temperatures in the lower 60's and clouds. Only a short walk around the park. Laundry day.

Outdoor Chapel area

We actually checked in on Sun. but didn't move in until Mon. Lots of empty sites but quite a few RV's were returning. I thought these were rocks but up close many were pieces of big shells. Maybe I'll find my big conch shell here?  

It was in the 70's on Sun. 

Just read a great book, Where the Crawdads Sing, by DeliaOwens. I couldn't put it down! On a lighter note I've been reading  a quilting cozy mystery series by Carol Dean Jones. Thanks to Lee's Summit Library for making library cards lifelong--1 month before we moved. Pat and I have taken full advantage of the library as we travel. I'm always looking for new titles. Any suggestions? 

I am also getting books on my tablet from the Lee 's Summit library to read to my Boston grandkids when we zoom. We're having  fun with the A to Z Mystery series by Ron Roy. Since their Dad's name is Josh we all get a kick out of one of the main character's, Josh. He's always hungry. 

I'm delighted that Pat fixed my camera. Here's to better pictures!

Where are the Piepers? Myrtle Beach, S.C.