Tuesday, June 17 - We left this morning at 9:25 AM & 78 degrees and arrived at 12:19 & 84 degrees after driving 128 miles. It was a good trip up, with some traffic, but we made good time. We also got set up in fairly good time. The lake here is beautiful and the campsites very nice, spacious and private. We do not have a view of the lake, but will adjust. This is a well stocked lake and word has it that we may even catch some fish. It is much hillier here, with thick woods. We have no cell phone access, poor tv reception, but great internet signal. Figure!
Wednesday, June 18 - We had to pull the cover over us in the night as the temperature went down to the upper 50s. We discovered that something had taken one of Joan's sandals during the night and are not sure what took it. There are many raccoons here and maybe one of those bandits did it. We got up and took our coffee walk down by the lake following the path. It was a nice cool walk down and made us wish we had brought the fishing rods. After breakfast we returned with the rods, but John only managed one slightly undersized bass caught around the fishing deck. This is a wonderful area and even though our site is not on the lake we are really enjoying the view of the woods. It makes for a nice change. After dinner we hiked back to the lake, fishing rods in hand. Many people were around the lake fishing as there is easy access to almost every area on the lake. There was little action, however, and none for us.
Thursday, June 19 - We got up, made coffee, packed breakfast bars and headed for a hike to Marble Mine about a mile nearly straight up. It is a beautiful maple forest, so it was quite dense and cool. At the end was a cave (blocked off) and pond with a boardwalk. On the way back we took the trail to the lake and fished from the bank. We both hooked two fish each, but were only able to land one each. I guess if we were professional baseball players that would mean that we were batting .333 each. Most players would take that any day. All in all it was a very enjoyable, although demanding morning. The bodies seem to complain a bit more these days. We are really enjoying being here. The weekend is coming, so things might not be quite as quiet as they have been.
Friday, June 20 - We got up, but not early enough to beat the rush to the best fishing spots. However, we discovered that there is an area on the far side of the lake where there are no places to sit down to fish. Since we don't sit down to fish anyway (except in the kayaks) this works in our favor. Joan hooked the first one, but it got off just before she got it to shore. John followed shortly casting close to shore with a June-bug colored lizzard and hooked a very nice catfish. He fought real well and weighed out at just under four pounds. He graciously agreed to join us for dinner. We are taking it easy during the warmest part of the day.
Friday, June 20 - Continued - Update on catfish. He was very muddy tasting. What a disappointment! Bruce, the park host said that he caught one about the same size and it was muddy tasting as well. We returned to fish in the evening and John caught two bass. One was just under keeper size and one was just over. He released both of them. Joan had three on and lost all of them.
Saturday, June 21 - We got up fairly early, made coffee, and headed down for more fishing. John lost one and caught one and Joan came up empty. It was very nice out on the water and we were able to keep away from the crowds by going to the more undeveloped side of the lake. Thunder came around in the evening so we decided not to venture out. Instead we put a movie (Hoosiers) on and had a theater night.
Sunday, June 22 - We got up early and headed to Trion United Methodist for their 8:45 Contemporary Service. It was quite nice and we got acquainted with many very friendly people there. We stopped at Jim's restaurant in Summerville and had a nice breakfast afterwards. We fished again in the evening, but were limited to one bream that John caught on the flyrod using a red popper.
Monday, June 23 - Today is clean camper day. We also got some things put away and ready to leave tomorrow. We were online for a long time trying to figure out future campsites, especially when John's daughter and our grandkids join us in July. We are experiencing some thunderstorms in the area, so probably will not stray far from camp.
Birds sighted:
red-headed woodpecker
brown thrasher
crows
mourning doves
great blue heron
Canada geese
wild turkeys
Carolina wren
red-shouldered hawk
Animals sighted:
white-tailed deer
fox squirrel
ground squirrel
American box turtle
View pictures:
http://picasaweb.google.com/johnjoanW/JamesHSloppyFloydStateParkNearSummervilleGaJune17242008
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