{"id":23656,"date":"2015-09-03T17:44:31","date_gmt":"2015-09-03T21:44:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.iloveshelling.com\/blog\/?p=23656"},"modified":"2026-11-02T08:22:23","modified_gmt":"2026-11-02T13:22:23","slug":"cruising-to-sea-treasures-of-diamonds-and-pearls","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.iloveshelling.com\/blog\/2015\/09\/03\/cruising-to-sea-treasures-of-diamonds-and-pearls\/","title":{"rendered":"Cruising to Sea Treasures Of Diamonds And Pearls"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Shells<\/a><\/p>\n

I had the best time beach combing with some pretty amazing folks yesterday on our iLoveShelling Adventure with Sight Sea-R Cruises<\/strong><\/a> to Little Hickory Island yesterday. For some reason I felt like I already knew John and Amy from Colorado and when they showed me their shell loot, I felt like they were shelling twins to Clark and me. LOL Those are the shells (in the top photo) they found in the first half hour of hitting the beach.<\/p>\n

\"John<\/a><\/p>\n

There were shells in the water and also a few nice piles up on the beach as well.<\/p>\n

\"beach<\/a><\/p>\n

How could I not fall in love with Don and Delores from Michigan as they both have such a love for shelling and spread that happiness around to everyone.<\/p>\n

\"Don<\/a><\/p>\n

Here are a few of their fave shells they found. Such beauties.<\/p>\n

\"Shells<\/a><\/p>\n

Brandon, Jacob and Robin (NJ) found some awesome shells too…<\/p>\n

\"Brandon,<\/a><\/p>\n

Check out Jacob’s perfect ALBINO LIGHTNING WHELK. It is gorgeous! And Its amazing how many NUTMEGS were found on the trip too.<\/p>\n

\"Albino<\/a><\/p>\n

So after I took the picture with Brandon, Jacob and Robin’s shells, Robin came up to me a few minutes later to show me another shell she found. Excellent ALPHIE, Robin!<\/p>\n

\"Alphabet<\/a><\/p>\n

Linda and Mike (New Hampshire) were thrilled they found some new shells and beach bling they’ve never found before.<\/p>\n

\"Linda,<\/a><\/p>\n

Look at all the SEA PEARLS! It’s always fun to find something different washed up on the beach and it was the SEA BEANS for Mike and Linda. Another gift of the sea… PEARLS!<\/p>\n

\"sea<\/a><\/p>\n

Local sheller Ramona (Estero) has never been able to make it to Big Hickory before since you can only get there by boat. 
\n<\/a><\/p>\n

\"Ramona<\/a><\/p>\n

I’m thrilled she came with us for her first adventure to the island… and that she found treasures like diamonds in the rough.<\/p>\n

\"Seashells<\/a><\/p>\n

I always love to meet the “mini” lovers … and Patty (Chicago) was the “mini” shell girl yesterday. 
\n<\/a><\/p>\n

\"Patty<\/a><\/p>\n

See? A handful of mini goodness.<\/p>\n

\"IMG_2632<\/a><\/p>\n

Toni and Danielle (Orlando) were finding lots of keepers up n the high wrack line.<\/p>\n

\"Toni<\/a><\/p>\n

Toni’s favorite shell was this gorgeous and colorful SHARKS EYE that sparkled like a diamond too.<\/p>\n

\"sharks<\/a><\/p>\n

We had newbie shellers on our shelling trip…and they were so much fun! Texas girls Shelley (she was born to shell), Mitzy, Linda and Judy found lots of shells to put in their matching nets and bags (heehee) and saw each shell as a beautiful gift of the sea. They were bursts of fresh air all by themselves. 
\n<\/a><\/p>\n

\"First<\/a><\/p>\n

As with all iLoveShelling shelling cruise trips, each passenger received a $25 gift certificate to Congress Jewelers’ Sealife By Congress<\/a><\/strong> store. Thank you Congress for being so generous to our shelling community.<\/p>\n

\"Sealife<\/a><\/p>\n

It was a beautiful day with a beautiful group of shellers.<\/p>\n

\"Beach<\/a><\/p>\n

And with a lot of beautiful sharing of shells going on too.<\/p>\n

\"sharing<\/a><\/p>\n

The boat ride to the island was even so amazing as we cruised through Estero Bay with sightings of ROSEATE SPOONBILLS, DOLPHINS, a SEA TURTLE, a MANATEE, a STINGRAY and oodles of other birds and fish. It was truly a in paradise. \"Estero<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I had the best time beach combing with some pretty amazing folks yesterday on our iLoveShelling Adventure with Sight Sea-R Cruises to Little Hickory Island yesterday. For some reason I felt like I already knew John and Amy from Colorado and when they showed me their shell loot, I felt like they were shelling twins […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":23637,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1897,2020,674],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23656","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-big-hickory-island","category-sea-bean","category-sea-pearl","et-has-post-format-content","et_post_format-et-post-format-standard"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iloveshelling.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23656","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iloveshelling.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iloveshelling.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iloveshelling.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iloveshelling.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23656"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.iloveshelling.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23656\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iloveshelling.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23637"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iloveshelling.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23656"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iloveshelling.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23656"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iloveshelling.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23656"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}