A 31-mile canoe adventure in the "land of the trembling earth"— Georgia’s Okefenokee Swamp.
Streams of sunlight poured through the loblolly pines as five paddlers packed their canoes at Kingfisher Landing on the eastern edge of the Okefenokee Swamp.
Dark cool shadows of low flying clouds skittered across the black water when we launched our canoes to paddle 31 miles across the swamp to Stephen Foster Park.
Dick, who is the oldest in his early 70s paddled with Vickie, the youngest who is in her mid 40s. Marty was solo and Bud and I, the only married couple, paddled tandem.
Our first day was a 12-mile paddle through sunlit prairies among heart-shaped floating pond lilies and leathery umbrella like sacred lotus to a covered wooden platform at Maul Hammock Lake. Unlike a national park a wildlife refuge is for the preservation of habitat. The platforms and most of the trails are therefore accessible only by canoe and require a permit.
The swamp lies in the shallow dish of an old seabed and forms the headwaters of the Suwanee and St. Mary rivers.
We stopped to inspect the large greenish yellow flowers of the insect eating trumpet plant. Northern pitcher and cobra plants also grew nearby. Insects are attracted to the odor of decay inside the pitcher and are forced in by slanting hairs.
Vickie, who was new to the swamp smiled with delight.
My rhythmic paddle strokes were hypnotic. In "river time" I have flashes of self-forgetfulness—my life feels simpler, lighter and clearer, my mind silent, alert and at peace. They are holy moments that purify my soul.
We stopped to watch a six-foot alligator sunning itself on the bank. It stared at us with brown glassy eyes then walloped the water with its tail and slipped in.
The loud whooping mating calls from a pair of sand hill cranes rang out when we collapsed on our 20 by 28-foot platform. Five hours of paddling, half of it against the current in the sun, had left us exhausted.
We cooked dinner to the malodorous sounds of the spring peeper’s birdlike peeps, the pig frog’s pig like grunts, the river frog’s eerie snore and the bullfrog’s deep o-ruum. Millions of brilliant stars exploded into view when the sun sank below the red watery horizon. The continuous hum from clouds of hovering mosquitoes sent us to bed early.
But not for long! We woke with the sound of clinking cutlery. A large bushy raccoon with a dark eye mask rummaged through our utensils in my flashlight’s beam. It slunk into the dark.
Just after midnight Marty began to vomit violently. Painful stomach cramps and diarrhea started him on the first of many visits to the outhouse pit toilet. His face was gray when he slowly broke camp with our assistance the following morning.
In spite of our protests Marty was determined to paddle. After three hours he realized he had lost his strength and acquiesced.
Since Dick was the strongest paddler we made a bed for Marty in his boat at the Dinner Pond platform lunch stop. Bud paddled in Marty’s canoe and Vickie and I in the other.
We canoed the remaining six miles through large broad-based cypress forests, black water lakes and sandy pine islands. The swamp alternated from light and colorful to dark and mysterious. It was hard to tell the trees from their mirror image in the dark water.
Fortunately Marty felt better at the Big Water Lake platform and was able to sip his chicken soup. He even felt strong enough to paddle out the following morning.
We were three miles from the take out when dark clouds rolled in.
There was a deafening thunderclap. A bolt of lightening lit up the sky and it began to rain very hard. We put on our ponchos, picked up our paddling pace and arrived at the park in record time.
Back home my spirit remained in the swamp where the light is brushed by brightness and with the sense of being part of something bigger than myself.
My husband and I love canoeing and white water rafting... we've been down a few choice rivers (the Chattooga in Georgia and the New in Virgina come to mind) paddling and praying depending on the class of rapid ... My spirit is also often left back at the river after having come home.
Your story is idyllic, in spite of Marty becoming ill... I am so sorry for that and hope it was nothing serious.
A book of nature inspired poems and essays, written from the heart and soul of a life-long nature, animal, and wilderness lover, and dedicated to today’s children - Earth's only hope for a better tomorrow.
This book won 'The Poetry Category'
