Tomorrow Alexandra, Trey, and I head off on a 2 week trip to Washington D.C. and back. We’re heading up there for my brother’s wedding. We’ll be visiting several folks along the way including my grandparents in Sweetwater, my aunt in Greeneville, my parents in Richmond, and Mike Lowery in DC. Pray for our safety on the road and that Trey’s first 2 weeks away from his mother won’t be too rough.
Today we decided to hang around instead of heading off on another hike. Following are some pics from our swim down at the lake.
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Wow, what a great find! The Georgia State Parks website says it best:
This little-known gem on the Flint River is the perfect location for a daytime getaway. Visitors can cool off in the gently flowing river, skip rocks across the water, picnic on the river’s edge… A three-mile trail winds along the bank and up rocky bluffs, offering excellent views from high above the river.
This state park is probably my favorite so far. Even though it is 50 miles east of us, the drive is really scenic so it goes by quickly. The trail was well-maintained and a bit more challenging and the river was wonderful. Wonderful to look at and wonderful for Trey to play in. It was shallow, sandy, and the current wasn’t too strong. He just crawled around in the water digging up stone after stone and throwing it back into the water.
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Just before leaving Florida we got our family photo taken for the Seminole First Baptist Church directory. LifeTouch was doing the photos for the church and I’d have thought that company with 70 years’ experience in professional portraiture would have done a better job. The photographer did fine but whoever printed the thing really screwed up.
Take a look at the closeup of my shirt. That is a photo I took of the actual 8×10 print we received. I’ve seen patterns like that when images are compressed on small LCD screens but I didn’t know it was possible on physical prints. Very creative LifeTouch, very creative!
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You can’t win them all. Today’s hike was terrible. It started when Google Maps led me to believe the trail was much closer to Macon than it was. After driving over an hour we got to the 1.8-mile trail and started hiking. After just a short while we realized that the trail was very poorly kept and not frequently traveled. Most frustrating to me were the dozens of large trees that had fallen across the trail. 
Alexandra was most frustrated by the TONS of spiders that had spun countless webs across the path. The many ticks that climbed our legs weren’t very fun either.
The worst part was that at the end of the almost 2 miles of hiking, we had to turn around and do it again since the trail wasn’t a loop. Ugh.
Want to see more spider photos? I posted them on my blog.
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Today we took Alexandra to a park just across town along the Ocmulgee River. This land was declared a National Monument in 1934 to preserve the numerous Muscogean (Creek Indians) mounds and artifacts found around them. Several archeological digs have occurred over the years and the visitor center has a nice little museum that displays the finds.
Despite the near 100 degree weather Trey was very excited about exploring the area. He ran from mound to mound only stopping to drive his toy train across the bridge that crosses over the real train tracks. 
At the end of our promenade was walked across a swamp and ended back in the woods where a swarm of bees were nesting at the base of a tree. Alexandra took Trey to safety and I decided to stay and photograph them. I got a little too close and was issued a stern warning in the form of a sting on the ear. Luckily, the swelling died down after about 30 minutes and I didn’t have a relapse of my disastrous bee sting from the summer of 2000 that left me unable to walk for 5 days.
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Another day, another park. Once again we drove just 30 minutes and found ourselves in a great natural setting. High Falls was a bustling industrial town in the early 1800s but when the railroad bypassed it in 1880 it quickly became a ghost town. You can still see remnants of the old mill and some other buildings.
We took a 3 mile hike through the woods along a “Non-Game Trail”. Rebellious young Trey decided to disobey and play a “Game” along the trail. Every 40-50 feet a tree had been painted with a bright yellow brush stroke to mark the path. For the entire trail we went from painted tree to tree. Trey would insist on touching the paint then eagerly look for the tree. When he spotted it he would yell “Ellow!” and giggle with excitement.
We also spotted a wild raccoon in a tree and Trey insisted that it was a baboon and not a raccoon. I’ll let you look at the pictures and decide. I’ve also posted a separate slideshow with nature photos I took today.
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