Huntington Beach State Park (3.0 miles; d=3.02)
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First stop was at the ranger station which looked more like a beach-front condominium than a visitor center...
Driving into the park the wildlife was out to greet us...Egrets, Herons, and even these two Anhinga's were easily seen from the roadway...
The start of my short hike would begin at the park nature center which is a nice place to get familiar with the ecology of the park...
Adjacent to the nature center a huge boardwalk leads out onto the salt marsh...
Each tiny bump in the sand is a Fiddler Crab...there were thousands of these little guys scurrying all over the mud flats...
A Great Egret could be seen spearing fish not too far off between the reeds...
Looking north across the salt water marsh the high rises of Myrtle Beach can be seen in the distance reminding us what might have become of this beautiful environment without preservation...
Making our way farther out into the salt water marsh...
At the end of the boardwalk was a nice observation platform along the waterway which bisects the marsh...
Sandpiper Pond Nature Trail Hike Route Map
My hike of the Sandpiper Pond Nature Trail at Huntington Beach State Park as depicted a la Google Earth...
The main hike today would be along the 2-mile Sandpiper Pond Nature Trail...a short hike, but with temps pushing above 90-degrees I figured it'd be about enough...
Heading out on the Sandpiper Pond Trail I was immediately surrounded by numerous oaks, cedar, and pine which would be my companions for most of the hike...
A rather tall oak for this area spreads its branches high above the canopy...
Maybe a quarter mile or so in I passed this strange raised platform...not sure the purpose aside from providing a place for folks to stand and get a bit closer to the canopy...
It may be from my time up in the North Woods, but I've always had a soft spot for cedars. Here, I pass an attractive little Atlantic Red Cedar...
A common wildflower of the southern Atlantic shore, the Sea Daisy was a common sight where the trail got a bit closer to the water...
A break in the trees provided my first view of the trails namesake, Sandpiper Pond...
Atop a nearby dune was a wooden platform to give a bit higher view over Sandpiper Pond...
Sandpiper Pond as seen from the first side path down to its shore that I came to. Once an inlet from the ocean, the pond still occasionally gets flooded during storm making the water brackish (meaning a mix of salt and fresh)...
These coastal plant communities always impress me with how dense the foliage is...an all but unbroken blanket of green from the ground to the sky...
On a hot, muggy day such as this one, I found it nice that the trail wasn't afraid to stay out of the sun most of the time...
This intricately painted little beauty is known as Saltmarsh Sabatia...
The trail as it winds around and under the branches of a particularly wide, overhanging oak...
The name of this flowering shrub escapes me but it was a quite common sight in the more open areas along the trail...