Good Decisions: Hilton Head and Back

February 19-21, 2026

Port Royal to Skull Creek, Hilton Head and back – docked

Sometimes we make a series of good decisions.

There is one bridge connecting Hilton Head to the mainland; it regularly backs up for miles.  There’s really only one way to drive from Port Royal to that bridge, and that route regularly jams up.  It can take 90 minutes to drive the 35 miles from home to the Hilton Head school cluster – and my conference was another 25 minutes from there.  Three days of that commute would have been awful.

Our first good decision was for John to bring Lailia to Hilton Head for a few days.  I had an afternoon meeting in a school there on Thursday afternoon and was attending a conference there on Friday and Saturday.

John got to spend some time on the water in great weather.

I met John at Skull Creek Marina on Thursday afternoon.  That marina was a 6 minute drive from the school I was in.

On Friday, John drove me to the conference.  This was a win-win: he had the car all day and we didn’t have to deal with conference parking.  Plus, we didn’t have to contend with morning bridge traffic snarls.

Friday afternoon was gorgeous: sunny, breezy and warm.  We headed to Coligny Beach just to check out the ocean.

Hilton Head is in the middle of an off-season beach renourishment project.  Sand is pumped in through about 1,000 feet of pipe which are moved every 6-8 weeks through the late fall through very early spring.  The pipes have sand ramps over them so folks can still get to the ocean

In typical early spring fashion, that gorgeous afternoon weather turned into a rain storm in about 15 minutes.

Our second good decision was to not stay in Hilton Head through Sunday.  Our original plan was to explore more of Hilton Head Saturday after the conference ended and then head back to Port Royal on Sunday.

Unfortunately, Mother Nature had other ideas.  The weather forecast called for seriously gusty winds, heavy rain, and precipitous drops in temperature on Sunday (the same weather pattern that would bring feet of snow to the Northeast).  John set out on Lailia at slack tide late morning Saturday.

I made another good decision to spend a little time hiking the Ibis Pond trail at Pinckney Island National Wildlife Refuge.

We had dinghied over to this refuge a few years ago when we anchored in Makay Creek.  We didn’t spend a lot of time on the island because it was hot and I was sick (and miserable).  I always planned to return and finally had some time.

The trails here are nicely maintained, wide and flat (pretty much EVERYTHING here is flat, actually).

Ibis Pond was just what I hoped – lots of critters (including a bunch of gators).  The weather was pretty close to perfect, lots of sun and warm breezes.

John and I each arrived in Port Royal a few hours later.  We tied up at the t-head to wait for slack tide at 6:00 pm. 

Just before 5:00, the front started moving in. 

Favorable tides are way more important than avoiding a bit of rain. We moved Lailia back to her slip in a downpour – but it was warm so getting wet was no big deal.

A final good decision was to brave the wind to hike around Port Royal.

Cypress Wetlands were fairly protected from wind.  Lots of critters were out, including wood storks which haven’t been around all winter.  They’ll be nesting here soon.

The gators were trying to soak up as much solar energy as they could.

I found a bit of history in Port Royal – this buoy broke free in a storm in 1970 and was found 6,000 miles away in Scotland the following year.  The buoy was returned to Port Royal in 1973  and now serves as a memorial to all officers who lost their lives at sea.

Port Royal also has a sand beach (called Sands Beach) that lies along Battery Creek.  The town constructed a boardwalk along Battery Creek with a large observation tower. 

This area received the full force of the wind.