Great Dismal Swamp Hike 12/20/22

On Tuesday we hiked the Great Dismal Swamp Wildlife Refuge on the Chesapeake side of the

refuge. Although some people still drove to the other side of the refuge, they caught up with us

about 10:30. We had 23 Tuesday Groupers to show up there on the Portsmouth Ditch gravel

road. Bill B. and I stopped at Hardees at 7:30 for our breakfast there in Deep Creek. We drove

over to the trail head about 8:15 and parked alongside the gravel road and it wasn’t long after

that the cars started driving in. I asked each to pull in behind us and it wasn’t long we had 16

cars and trucks lined up, taking up about all of this parking area.

It was Sandra birthday and Margaret gave me a card to take to her, Margaret couldn’t make

this trip, and I got everyone to sign it without Sandra knowing anything about it. I was going to

buy a cake for her, but didn’t have any way to carry it, so I bought a container of Pineapple and

one of Cano lope. Both of these went fast as we stopped for our lunch and decided to have the

party before we ate, after all we are adults, at a little spot called The Wood Duck Pond. We all

sang Happy Birthday to Sandra and I gave her the card and she gave a speech, thanking

everyone. I guess the singing chase the bears away, right Ellis?

There was one small tree that was a “high step over” about one mile into our hike and I wanted

to remove it. John O. had a small electric chain saw, John couldn’t make this hike, and Jane

brought it with her so we could cut this tree out of the trail. With the help of Steve, Bob, and

Bill L. we removed it in short order, and some of the group said they had never seen anyone cut

a tree with a chain saw, so we had a small class on tree removal, the Tuesday Group is not only

a fun thing, but it is educational also.

I had a contest with a few prizes set up for all of the kids that had sign-up for this hike, but out

of the 10 that sign-up only 3 made the hike, more prizes for the 3 right?

The hike was right at 5 miles and that is what I told everyone it would be, and they were not

Julian Miles either. I had worked on 2 of the bridges and replaced the boards on both of them

to make it easier to walk over on Monday that is how I knew the tree was in the trail. After all

the rain we had I thought we would be walking through water but the trail was dry all the way

through. I am sure we will be going back to this area and do another hike there in 2023 because

I still need to show Ellis a bear in the Great Dismal Swamp, one of these days Ellis, one of these

days…………

Bruce

******************

Thanks Bruce for leading this hike! I'm glad you celebrated Sandra's birthday on the hike. It was nice to have some young hikers too. Some of the hikers had not seen trail maintenance with a chainsaw before so that was a bonus for them.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/sg4RCsMxmYEazueDA

Bill B