Camping - Swamp Style!

Happy Happy Spring! Things are abloom here - the trees are budding, the flowers are opening up, and the weeds are magnificent.

Joe and I celebrated the coming of spring (and the long weekend from my still-going-very-well-job) to go on a wild camping trip. Literally. We went for an overnight camping trip into the Okefenokee Swamp! We kayaked in (7.5 miles to the campsite) and spent 1 night in the wilds, with all the critters and the full moon, and saw some really cool stuff.

Here are the top 9 cool things we saw:

(1) No garbage anywhere. It's so nice to see people who respect the world enough not to leave their McDonald's bags in the bushes.

(2) Lots of dragonflies - big ones, little ones, red, blue, purple. I rescued a big red one that had gotten its wings wet and couldn't get out of the water. Caught him on my paddle and deposited him for drying on a branch. Here's a pic of one that Joe saw:

(3) Also rescued a small fish (about 3.5 - 4 inches long) that had somehow flopped its way onto a lily pad and couldn't get back in the water. I pushed the lily pad down so the fish could swim away.

(4) The lily pads! They were HUGE! The size of big dinner plates! There were little frogs that would jump from one to another. Very cute.

(5) A little green lizard swimming across the channel. I didn't know those little guys could swim!

(6) Wild purple irises, grown in clumps. Beautiful.

(7) A cormorant (I think) or an Ahingi (Joe thinks) that we called the "Up & Over Bird." This bird was not to be distracted by things in his way, and instead of going around them (so much work!) he just jumped on top and plopped over. Want proof? Check this out:

Yep. It jumped on the back of Joe's kayak. While Joe was paddling.

It also jumped over this root.

It also jumped onto the walkway to our tent site.

(8) Owls. Ok, we didn't see the owls, but we heard them. Our campsite was called Monkey Lake, which they think is so named because of the owls that live there. They start hooting at each other and get excited and hoot higher and higher, til they sound like a bunch of screaming monkeys. We actually heard them. It was BIZARRE. If we didn't know better, we'd think we were in an African jungle, surrounded by chimps.

(our campsite during the day)

(our campsite in the evening)

(9) A raccoon, curled up and sleeping around the trunk of a tree, about 50 feet up. It was a bare tree near the interstate and this raccoon had climbed to the top, curled into a ball on top of some outstretched branches, and was taking a snooze.

(10) Gators! Lots of gators! We got really close a few times (not necessarily by choice - the channel was very narrow in some parts). But they weren't aggressive at all, surprising actually considering Joe discovered a little Gator Nursery - there were 17 tiny little alligators there, and we saw mama about 6 feet away. Very cool.

(11) A swamp rabbit! Joe heard something running through the underbrush and thought it was a squirrel. I peered to see what it was, and realized it was a medium size brown rabbit that waded through the water and went on his merry way. Bizarre. I didn't know there WERE such things as swamp rabbits.

All in all it was a really nice trip. We kayaked about 15 miles total, which honestly I didn't think I could do. The weather was great, the mosquitos weren't too horrible (until dusk) and it was just lovely.

On Sunday, we went to Bonaventure Cemetery to see if the azaleas were in bloom yet.

They were.