SUNDAY –
When we last left off our group, they were in the midst of a fierce battle
against time and a horde of cold-blooded beasts encroaching upon their camp.
Just
kidding. But that is kind of how this feels. We went to sleep Saturday night
with the sounds of the swamp at full song – birds, gators, mosquitos the size
of Chihuahuas. Friday night it wasn’t nearly as loud, I’m guessing because of
the cold. But with the warmer weather, the swamp life woke up and that included
the bull gators and their ominous, deep, throaty calls.
I’m not
100% sure when they stopped, but it had to be right around midnight or shortly
thereafter. My guess is because it started to get chilly and while it wasn’t
nearly as cold as the night before, it was definitely too cold for cold-blooded
reptiles. Anyways, they continued to call to each other well into the night and
the next morning we discovered how close they had come. There wasn’t really
much evidence, but Bob claimed to have heard a splash near his tent. Sounded
like about a six-footer according to him and Jeff and was enough to wake them
both up. Bob says he sat there hoping Jeff aka “Swamp Man” would come barreling
out of his tent to slay the beast… but no dice. Jeff was merely waiting for
them to try to enter his tent for some snuggle time, and if that was the case
he had a trusty knife waiting… like that was going to do much good. If a gator
wants to snuggle with you, I have a feeling it’s kind of like the scene in
“Without a Paddle” when the bear cuddles Seth Green’s character, Dan Mott.
There’s not much you do except for lay there and sing “I’m all out of love” or
something similar.
The
evidence I mentioned was down from Bob’s tent where I found where the gator had
slid from the bank and into the water, pushing down grass as he went. Yup.
Pucker factor is about a 10 on that one I would say.
We also
had another visitor who made it up onto the platform and apparently made an
attempt at coming in to snuggle with Dad and me. Now, if you’ve ever done any
form of camping you know the simple rules of putting your food away, usually up
where even you have trouble reaching it because of raccoons. And sure enough,
that is our guess for who our guest was. I heard him shuffling his little paws
on the platform and when he bumped up against the tent, apparently dad gave him
a light pop to send him on his way.
But we
survived and of course, the morning was not a disappointment either. I woke up
before sunrise, again, mostly because I heard Dave R. tearing down his tent and
gear but also because I heard the sounds around me. The birds were at full song
before the sun was even peaking over the trees. It’s really an awesome site to
see the glass-like water and just silhouettes of trees.
Now, Dave
R., Jeff and Dave S. were all up earlier than most of us because they had their
hearts set on being the first ones to a barbeque joint in, I believe, Waycross,
and they had all ridden together. And, of course because they were the first
ones up and out every other morning, so why not today as well? This is also how
we came to enter the swamp with 10 but come back with only 7 as I eluded to
waaaaaaay back in the first post. But we saw them off and took our time eating
our breakfasts and cleaning up because we technically had the platform until 10
and it wasn’t like housekeeping was going to come barging in to turn out our
beds and such for the next guests.
During
breakie, Bob, Dad, and I eyed the pond/prairie behind our campsite and talked
about if we thought we could paddle back there. Not as in asking for permission
but more along the lines of is the water deep enough for our boats. Dad and I
decided that our boats were more than capable as long as we did it before
loading them down with our gear and so we went head and gave it a try. It was a
little difficult at first because there was a lot of reeds/grass, but once we
got going, we realized there was certainly plenty of water.
And
plenty of activity. As Dad and I paddled around we watched several birds flying
into the swamp and this had me thinking back to the night before when I remembered
seeing several groups of birds flying in the direction of the reserve’s
entrance. Now this morning, they’re all coming back in. As if they punch a
clock and head home each night and then come back like they work for the state.
OK, Okefenokee Swamp and Georgia, I’m onto you and your tactics.
Anyways,
Dad and I just aimlessly paddled around back there for a bit. I was honestly
looking for the kingfisher from the day before because I wanted a better, more
close up picture of him. And of course the whole time we’re keeping a close eye
out for signs of gators because we KNOW they were here just the night before.
While we didn’t see any kingfishers or gators we did see two more sandhill
cranes fly in and land, more egrets, herons and such.
As I was
trying to sneak up on one heron in particular, something flew pretty close
overhead and as I looked up I realized it was a pileated woodpecker. So I
quickly changed course and as I was turning I noticed something even bigger
swooping in the opposite direction: another owl! Yes! I’m sorry if I’m overly
excited, but how often do you honestly see owls in the wild? Take it from me as
I have hiked all over Hitchcock Woods for the past few years to try to find
them: I’ve only seen two in HW and I’ve spent way too much time in there.
Back to
the owl, it took some maneuvering back around a clump of trees with Dad ahead
of me, but I eventually got where I could see the owl better. And I have to
say, that alone made our trek off the path worth it.
We
eventually decided to head back to camp because we really did need to get
packed up so we could head back to civilization.
As we did
head in, I spent some time moving from the front to the back and up to the
front of the group again. I was just taking it all in and I couldn’t help but
mention to Dad a few times, as others had done before me, how great of a trip
this was. On the one hand I’m sure he heard it way too many times, but
hopefully he appreciated that we all had a blast.
Heading
back the last 6.5 miles wasn’t terribly exciting from a story standpoint. Sure,
Bernie ran over a smaller gator with his boat and sent it into a frenzy trying
to escape him, but that was really about it. We all made sure to make a few
jokes about Bernie possibly needing to change his pants. I know I would have
had to after that.
As we got
closer we started running into a few groups in canoes heading out into the
swamp, including a semi-famous local celebrity. I didn’t know him or his name,
but Dad recognized him from ETV or some local channel as he has done some
segments on the swamp. He and his wife moved down here, fell in love with the
area and have spent many years exploring and learning about the swamp. And he
had two attractive ladies in another canoe in tow, explaining to them some facts
about the swamp. Yup, you win “Most Interesting Man of the Swamp.”
The final
send off out of the swamp for us was two hawks near the put-in/take-out area.
It would appear as if the female kicked the male out of the nest as if to say, “I
sit here and protect our young all day, every day now you go out and hunt!”
Amazing how that is the same no matter the species, right?
So this
brings this adventure to a close. I had a blast with our group even if it did
start off under less than ideal conditions and I hope I can do something like
this again. Dad has already started talking about trying the different areas of
the park and I am really hoping we can pull that off. Kind of like doing the
entire Edisto River in pieces, I would really like it if we could paddle the
entire Okefenokee Swamp in pieces.
Oh, by the way, here are a few from the first day from the GoPro. I hope to have a video posted to YouTube soon!
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