We went to the Okefenokee Swamp Park after some prodding from the kids. While I cleaned the kitchen, Derric and Katie cleaned the living room and dining room. That meant they were serious. This also meant I had to keep my promise today.
The trip was not a big one. We reached the entrance to the Swamp Park in about 15 minutes. This is how close we live in the swamp. The gate keeper was Derric and Katie's baby sister's daughter. When we pulled up, we reminisced about Derric when he was little. She said he used to run around their house when he was two years old hollering "Are you talking to Me?" Of course he doesn't remember, but the daughter told him they still say that around their house. She asked him "You didn't think you affected us that much, but you did?" and told him that "Bebay sure was going to be sorry she missed you today."
Unlike the other visitors that paused in the parking lot trying to read their free maps, we knew exactly where we wanted to go. Straight to the Chesser Homestead and then to the Boardwalk that lead to the Tower.
Derric brought his tools for capturing the trip. In his backpack he had his moleskine notebook, colored pencils, batteries, camera and binoculars. Katie thought she didn't need anything so she didn't bring anything. I think she changed her mind, because after ten minutes she started telling us what pictures to take.
I thought this would be a great time to capture some images for the Halloween ATC
swap that Marylin Healy is hosting on her blog site. I brought my Digital Sony Camera and my Minolta 35 mm camera with the big zoom lens on the end. My Minolta is currently loaded with black and white film. In my mind I could see myself finishing out this roll and putting it in the one hour photo this afternoon so I could play with altering the photographs. The night before, I just been reading Karen Michel's book "The Complete Guide To Altered Imagery" and my head was filled with ideas.
But, alas, the batteries in the Minolta had different ideas. They gave out and I didn't get to finish out the roll. So no B & W pictures of the Homestead. (Moral of the story: Always bring lots of batteries, that is what the backpack is for.)
I switched to the digital camera, whom I love and adore for it's instant gratification (and it's recharge cable.) Without this camera I would not have had the chance to catch the images of the rest of the trip and see them tonight.
We walked the boardwalk to the tower without much excitement. Unless seeing a moccasin to you is exciting. To us it strikes hits us as "Where's the hoe?" cause we usually see them in our yard. I hate snakes and I don't mind saying it.
At the tower we could see a 6-8 foot gator, and egret, and some sand hill cranes feeding off into the distance. It was so peaceful up there between me telling to the
kids "Please be quiet". Derric took his moleskine out and drew pictures of the animals we saw. We met a couple from Atlanta who helped up identify the sand hill cranes. After watching the gator watching the egret, we climbed down and started our walk back to the truck.
Derric scared the "blankedid blank" out of Katie when he hollered "snake". She turned just in time to see a little bitty snake swimming toward her. Even though we were safe on the boardwalk, she says she knows it was swimming fifty miles an hour coming after her. It stopped long enough for Derric to get it's picture.
It must have been the timing, because we saw more wildlife leaving the swamp than we did going in. On the road out of the swamp, we saw another mocasin. The photographer (Derric) in the backseat had to get a shot of that snake too. In the ditch along the road out, he spotted another gator and had to get a picture.
The photo is blurry but it's not the photographer's fault. It was the drivers fault. I wouldn't let them out of the car because we were less than 5 feet away from the gator.
So it was Derric hanging out of the window giving instructions. "Pull up some." "Whoa." "Now back up some." "Whoa, Momma whoa." "Now pull up some more." It was a trip.
In that short three and half hours,we finally made it out of the "safari" with pictures and drawings to create art, memories, and scrapbooks with.