Day 36 – 6:45 a.m., 52 degrees. Week Six begins with a Swamp Boat Tour this morning. First, Rob took a bike ride on the Fitness Trail and Upland Pine Trail and some Park roads. There are 3 Boat Tours per day; if the alligators aren’t awake yet this morning, we may take an afternoon Tour another day.
Swamp tour boat, Stephen C. Foster State Park, Fargo, GA
Go ahead, hop in the water in one of the kayaks! Stephen C. Foster State Park, Fargo, GA
A few clouds in the sky, more humid, it’s going to be warmer today for sure. We left the boat dock at 10 a.m.; didn’t get back till noon, totally worth the $15 per person price! There weren’t many people on the tour so we were free to roam around to take pictures, it’s an open boat with a canopy over the top to protect from the sun, and the tour host was a Park Ranger who clearly loved his job. We headed out on a canal – many alligators on the banks from little babies to very large adult gators, even close to where you rent the canoes and kayaks. Lots of birds, some turtles, lizards, and flowering plants. After a short distance we turned left into a more narrow channel, true swamplands. We learned all about cypress trees and lilly pads and the history of the area . The Ranger stopped often to let everyone take pictures and most of the time he went very slowly, which was necessary because at times we were passing through narrow openings with large moss-hung cypress trees on both sides. We saw one tree which was over 900 years old, according to the Ranger. Alligators were either basking on the bank or floating between the lilly pads or swimming on any side we looked – they swim surprisingly fast, using their long tails to move them thru the water. Rob took a short movie where you can actually see its’ tail undulating just below the water. Alligators can live to be 75 years old.
It was absolutely gorgeous in the swamp and we felt we could ride around like this all day. But alas, all good things come to an end, and we disembarked back at the Ranger Station. Headed back to the RV, had lunch, still mesmerized with what we’d seen. Decided we had to find a way to see more, and the kayaking we’d planned for tomorrow wasn’t going to get us beyond where we were today on the Tour. So we decided to rent a small boat with a motor and checked with the Office to make sure they were available and yes, they were. Oh boy! Drove back to the Suwanee River Sill area where we went yesterday and took a bike ride, really nice. But it was getting really hot and humid, so we turned on the air conditioner in the car and decided to drive to the nearest town to check it out. 17 miles to get out of the Park, turn right, go a couple of miles, pass maybe 10 buildings including homes, and that was Fargo, GA. Filled the gas tank for our swamp drive on Thursday and headed back to the campground. High today 87 degrees, partly cloudy, humid. We caught up our State map; now we’ve got GA and SC added. We didn’t put Florida on it because we haven’t camped there in the RV, YET.
