You might be able to tour Ted Turner's private island by the end of the year. Here's how
A 15-minute boat ride from Hunting Island State Park, past crab traps, old family fish camps and leaping dolphins, awaits 5,000 acres of untapped potential.
South Carolina park officials hope the public will see St. Phillips Island during limited tours by the end of the year. The state bought media mogul and conservationist Ted Turner's former private retreat in December for $5 million and is now assessing the possibilities.
The upside is clear — a 3,300 square-foot main house and its wide screened porch with stunning sunrise views is sure to command a premium weekly rental rate. Visitors and tour groups could traverse five trails atop ancient dunes and learn about the island ecosystem, wildlife and grand trees that distinguish St. Phillips Island from other barrier islands, including its state park neighbor.
But there are challenges for park officials trying to determine how to ready the island for public use. The aging water system and solar panels serving the house worked well for a family, but will need to be upgraded.
A team will decide in the coming months whether other accommodations should be built, how to use the current buildings and a plan to ensure visitors' safety.
"One of the things we have to solve is access to the park," state parks spokeswoman Dawn Dawson-House said on a boat ride to the island for a tour with local media members Friday morning. "As you can see, we have not solved that."
Park rangers are still learning about their new purchase.
The four-bedroom main house offers few frills apart from the surrounding views. Turner's sailing and fishing decor has been removed, leaving the outline of a mounted fish on one wall above where there was an aquarium.
One of the trails includes large, old magnolia trees and live oaks that lead scientists to believe the island wasn't always a barrier island. The magnolias would not have thrived in the salty sea spray, said Megan Stegmeir, an interpretive park ranger and naturalist at Hunting Island.
The Turner property caretakers have stayed to help as St. Phillips transitions to the public.
Boogie Tudor was working on Hilton Head Island when he first showed Turner the island in 1979.
"We hit it off in the boat," Tudor said.
Turner called him later to ask him to manage the property. Tudor's responsibilities included cooking, cleaning, laundry, maintaining the grounds — anything that needed to be done.
In the early days after Turner bought the island, Tudor helped offload lumber from a barge and build the main house and caretaker's home.
"All these boards have my fingerprints on them," Tudor said standing in the kitchen of the main house Friday afternoon.
Tudor's children and grandchildren grew up enjoying St. Phillips alongside the Turner family. And the longtime manager admits to being a little heartbroken at the transition.
But Turner rarely used the retreat in recent years, and Tudor said he is glad about the island's new use,
A private buyer was also interested before the state negotiated the bargain sale.
While considering the deal, state parks director Phil Gaines and Duane Parrish, head of the Parks, Recreation and Tourism Division, rode in all-terrain vehicles to the south end of the island's mile-long beach..
From there are sweeping, unobstructed views of the water, with Bay Point and St. Helena Island in the distance.
Gaines and Parrish talked over the deal from that spot, noting the large amount of money, but decided the island was a bargain they didn't want to pass up, Gaines said.
"Every time I come, I get that same feeling of there's no sign of humankind anywhere," Gaines said. "Where can you go and see this big of expanse and it's like you're the first person who has ever seen it. That's pretty special."
How much more investment the island will require for public use isn't yet known, Gaines said.
A team including archaeologists, historians, scientists and developers will analyze the potential educational value, visitor uses and market for the type of overnight accommodations that might eventually be possible.
A conservation easement on the property limits the number of new buildings. Park officials will work with local public safety officials to develop an emergency response plan for the island.
Gaines said he has found what appear to be ancient shell middens, mounds of shell that mark a village dump site.
Stegmeir pointed out changes to the island's landscape as evidence it once was apparently a sea island before shifting to a dynamic barrier island. She described how the spartina wrack carried deep into the marsh by flooding from Irma last fall would eventually break down and become mud and explained how Spanish moss is more akin to a pineapple than actual moss.
At a stop during an ATV ride along one of the old forest dunes, she asked the tour group to stand quietly and pay attention to the natural sounds.
You could envision a group of schoolchildren listening intently.
"I call it magical," Stegmeir said.
This story was originally published March 23, 2018 at 5:51 PM with the headline "You might be able to tour Ted Turner's private island by the end of the year. Here's how."