By Scott Shephard

Deb and I have left southern Florida and we spent last night in Port Saint Joe, Florida, which is on the southern edge of the Panhandle. (Quick: Can you name 2 other states that have Panhandles?*) This morning we will drive mostly west and leave Florida after almost two weeks here. It’s been good. It is bitter-sweet to think that after tomorrow we start heading north to our home, our loving cats, and to snow that still lingers in shady areas of our back yard. I will miss the warm, humid climate. I won’t miss the sometimes bumper to bumper traffic on the Florida highways.

What you are looking at in today’s photo is a small piece of shoreline of the Gulf Coast in a Florida state park located on what is confusingly either called Saint Joseph Peninsula or Cape San Blas. Either way, it’s considered a barrier “island.” And, like so many other locales on the Gulf Coast that we visited, it was torn to shreds by a hurricane - in this case it was Hurricane Michael which hit in October, 2018. It was a category 5 storm with winds up to 160 mph. 58 Americans died as a result of this storm.

The friendly lady at the entrance to the state park told us that the park was “torn in half” and that the campgrounds were mostly destroyed. In fact, the park just recently re-opened. Many houses in the developed area outside the park are either recently rebuild or in the process of being constructed. They are likely stronger and standing on much taller stilts. I’m not sure if houses on Gulf Coast barrier peninsulas are insurable but if they are, the premiums would be way out of reach to most “normal” wage earners.

All that aside, it was a fairly warm but very windy day to walk the Cape San Blas (or Saint Joseph Peninsula) beach. Deb looked for shells but, as she said, it was late in the day and all of the “shell professionals” had already taken the best.

Canon R5 f/5.6 1/500 sec ISO 100

*Oklahoma & Alaska