Paddling the Pond

Merchant's Mill Pond in Gates County.

First time we've ever taken the canoe out in all of these years. Got everyone new PFDs and new paddles for the canoe. It started out kinda rough, we put in off the road and then Leon went to park in the picnic area. Our plan was to try to find him along the shore somewhere. Well, there was alot more shore than we thought between him and us. We paddled around and thought we'd missed him and kept calling out his name. He finally heard us and we had to go a pretty good ways to get to him. That we couldn't find Daddy upset Ivan and Charlotte for awhile and Ivan wasn't sure he liked canoeing at all after that. The next morning, Curtis and I wanted to go again, but Ivan and Charlotte chose to hike a couple of shorter trails instead of looking for alligators in the canoe. We went our separate ways for about an hour and a half, then met back at the boat launch, then the younger ones were ready to get in the canoe. This time we let Curtis be in the stearn, our mistake. It's quite likely Ivan will never go canoeing again after that 15 minutes!

We saw so many turtles. And cool water birds. And beaver lodges, and beaver damage. What a beautiful place.