The West End of Dauphin Island AL (April 3, 2014)

The Place 

Dauphin Island is a long skinny barrier island running East and West.  You enter the island by bridge from the mainland about 2/3 of the way along the island.  The area to the East of that bridge is called the East End and is about 2 miles long.  The West End is about 5 miles long.  There is an additional 7 miles beyond the West End that used to be part of Dauphin Island that were separated from the island during Hurricane Katrina, creating a waterway that is known as the Katrina Cut. 

Up until now we’ve spent all of our time in the East End, so we decided to see what the West End was about.  Besides, Dana needed a haircut and we heard that there was a place somewhere on the West End.

The Adventure

It was another beautiful 80 degree day in Paradise.  We took our bicycles and peddled along the bike trail.  The West End has two tall buildings;  8 story tall condominiums right on an enormously wide public beach.  The Dauphin Island Pier is there as well.  We have seen pictures when it extended out as a fishing pier into the water.  It is now surrounded by sand as part of this incredibly wide beach.  The Dauphin Island website says that this happened recently when the sand from nearby Pelican Island migrated toward Dauphin Island and joined the beach.  An example of the constantly shifting sands on barrier islands, I guess.

 

By the way, Dauphin Island Elementary School is nestled in the dunes next to the pier.  Anyone want to change jobs?

 

This part of town has the island’s one hotel, some restaurants and shops, a private RV campground (no shade) and Beauty on the Beach.  Dana got an appointment for an hour later, so we peddled further down into the residential area to the west.  We never made it all the way to the end of the island, we turned back with just 1 more mile to go so Dana could get her hair cut.

The residential area at the West End was flat and rather unlovely.  After seeing the pretty houses on the shores of the East End we were struck by how blah the West End looked.  Unusually, there were houses between the water and the dunes.  We learned later that in a big hurricane, a whole row of houses in front of those houses had been washed away as well as any landscaping around the remaining houses.  Very precarious.

 
After the haircut, we went to The Islanders Restaurant for lunch – shrimp po-boy for her, oyster po-boy for him.  As we peddled back to the campground we stopped at Skinners to pick up fresh seafood for the next few dinners (tuna, shrimp, crawfish), and the Lighthouse Bakery to pick up a loaf of freshly baked French bread.  We asked Skinners to pack our purchases in extra ice because we still had a ways yet to peddle.  Russ enjoyed the cool ice against his back in his backpack.  The folks at the bakery had to cut the loaf in half so it would fit into Dana’s backpack.  Yes, we are eating well on this trip!