Lake Moultrie's 'Lost Beach' makes comeback

BONNEAU BEACH — Ed Riley did something last weekend he hadn't done in nearly six months. He launched his motorboat into Lake Moultrie.

Water had finally taken over the dry Bonneau Beach landing near his lakeside home. The horizon, for the first time in months, was dotted with the boats of largemouth bass fishermen instead of the stump fields of bottom tree trunks. And the fishermen were slaying them.

"Oh, it was a great feeling to be able to get back on the lake," he said. "It's good to see other people out on the water again."

The drought that kept the Lowcountry in a choke hold last fall seems to have loosened its grip. With a slew of rain across the state since the first of the year, Lake Moultrie has climbed more than 6 feet from its lowest point and is now only about three feet below full pond. The Edisto River at Givhans had been more sandbar than stream, but is now running six feet deep.

Read more in Thursday's edition of The Post and Courier.