The Pier

“Time is sort of a river of passing events, and as strong as it’s current:

No sooner is a thing brought to sight than it is swept by and another takes it’s place,

and this too will be swept away”

-Marcus Aurelius

9-14-19 UPDATE:  It’s been 2 years since I last posted pictures of the pier.  (I’ve been observing it for over 7 years now)  It’s still hanging in there with a few changes.  The birds are still roosting on what continues to remain above water.  Amazing is that the bait shop continues to remain basically the same as it’s been for several years.  Though it continues to remain “empty” and neglected there does appear to be having the grass cut in front of it.

Sept-2019

Sept-2019

Sept-2019

7-24-17 UPDATE:  I am still driving past this pier on the occasion that I go to Panama City Beach.  This last weekend I was able to go and Kayak and scuba dive at St. Andrew’s Jetty.  The pier is barely there any longer.  It seems to hang on though as it is persistence in saying “hey!  I’m still here!  I still have a few years left”.    The changes continue to go on around it though it’s left on it’s own, still standing.  The nearby 331 bridge is now much bigger, and a new boat dock was added beneath it.  Changes continue to go on but this pier just keeps hanging on.  The “bait shop” it was once part of continues to stand, unchanged.  I noticed a For Sale sign on the building today.

2017

2017

UPDATE 2016:  I began this post several years ago (2012) and this is an update to it.  I still go by this pier several times a year (instead of weekly).  A lot has changed.  What was a two lane highway is now four lanes, the nearby 331 bridge is enlarging to accommodate the added traffic over this piece of waterway and of course my own life has changed.  I no longer travel as often this way.  I do still go diving in PCB so I still get to watch the pier go through changes.  The Bait shop is now closed again (it had opened briefly over the past few years) and most of the pier is gone.  For a little while there was a BBQ place taking up residence in the old bait shop but it’s gone too now.

On the bright side, it now appears to be the resting point of many seagulls and such.  This is the bridge as I saw it this weekend.   It’s still beautiful.

You can read more about it below.

“Don’t wait. The time will never be just right” ~ Napoleon Hill

It didn’t seem to change at all

 

see the seagulls perched?

           ORIGINAL POST:  

I traveled to and from Alabama to Florida once a week.  I had been doing this for one year now. I began in September 2012 and it’s now September 2013.   It’s was really not that bad of shape in the beginning and I began shooting it every trip to compare any changes.  Now I only travel the route about once a month.  Many changes have been going on around the pier.  I just like seeing the pier.  It’s become familiar to me.  I look forward to that one spot along the way to stop and see it.  Funny I guess.

My once weekly drives are  about 2 1/2 hours one way.  Anyway, I pass this one spot on my trips which has always drawn me to it.  I can’t really explain why.  It’s just a pier.  It’s just an old wood pier but when I look at it I start thinking about what its history might have been like.  This pier has an old bait shop in front of it which has seen better days.  But it all adds to my thoughts about the pier.  I can just see a bunch of older men hanging out at the bait shop, swapping fishing stories over the years.    I can vision seeing boats pulling up and tying off to the pier to get their supplies, show off their catch.  Maybe even a few selling their catches there.  Actually, the pier has looked better than the bait shop but over the past 18 months the pier has been going through its own aging process.

I started this post with the first shots posted first with each one I shoot later below it.  I guess I should have added the new ones to the top of the post but oh well.  You’ll find the most recent shot of the pier at the end of the post.  I hope it hangs on.  It seems tough.  But it’s slowly loosing it’s battle with age winning.  Isn’t that always the case?

This first shot I took of it was the best.  I hit the pier at just the perfect time of day, with the water flat, and clouds forming a perfect back ground.

September 2012

February 2013

March 9, 2013

a result of recent flooding

5-28-13

Today I had a surprise when I drove by the pier.  A house boat tied up to it.

It was a strange feeling seeing the pier with  company.

today is still sits, a little lower in the water 9-22-13

“The clock never stops, never stops, never waits.  We’re growing old.  It’s getting late”  Ben Folds