Bob D. was up for a paddling trip, and we both wanted to do something besides the Green River or the Tuckaseegee. I suggested Cedar Creek in Congaree National Park, and Bob agreed.

The last time I paddled Cedar Creek it turned into an uphill death march, as we had paddled our canoes downstream, then tried to paddle back upstream to get to our cars. I was determined not to repeat that mistake. Initially we were going to take two vehicles and do a point-to-point paddle from Bannister Bridge to Cedar Creek Road, which would be about eight miles downstream. However, since it was a fairly long drive down there and there were just two of us, we decided to put in at Cedar Creek Road, paddle upstream for awhile, then paddle downstream with the current while we were tired. Made more sense to me. (more…)

Lots happening, and not much time to write about it. Laura and I discussed this, and we blame Furman. Since they have gone on a semester schedule their term is ending much earlier, and that’s thrown us off completely. I think, “Oh, Furman’s commencement is next weekend, so my school must be winding down” when we actually have a month more to go. With the compressed schedule, it seems like more is happening each weekend, and this past one was no exception. (more…)

This Saturday our Lowcountry Unfiltered group gathered for its monthly outing. We rendezvoused just southwest of Columbia to explore the Peachtree Rock Nature Preserve, managed by the Nature Conservancy and the South Carolina Department of Natural Services. Dr. John Nelson, botanist at USC, director of the state’s Herbarium, and member of our group would serve as our guide for the day.

In addition to John and myself, five others joined us.  We gathered at the entrance to the preserve at about 9:00, and got some preliminary information from John.  The area is one of the first set aside by the Nature Conservancy, and contains several unique habitat areas, including a long-leaf pine ecosystem.  The geology is also unusual. A hard layer of rock called ironstone covers softer layers of sandstone.  The sandstone has been eroding out from under the resistant upper layer, creating unique geological formations such as the namesake Peachtree Rock. (more…)

Thursday evening I met up with several of my Flickr photographer friends for a photo walk. Tracy (Wilhemina Lump Lump), Eric (RestedTraveler), and James (James Wellman) and I gathered at the entrance to Falls Park for a downtown expedition. It turned out to be a great gathering, and we really learned quite a bit from each other about various photographic techniques.

When we first planned this outing we had scheduled it for a couple of weeks ago, right as the snow storm hit. The intent was to go out and try to do some long exposure photography. When we reschedule, we failed to take into account the time change, so we still had more daylight than we had planned. Oops.

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This is going to be one of those multi-part posts.  I’ve got tons of information on this subject, and it won’t be possible to put it all in one story.

I’ve always been fascinated by lookout towers.  Near where I grew up in Laurens County there were two small monadnocks called the Little Knob and Big Knob.  The Big Knob had a fire tower on it, and I longed to scale its steps and enjoy the view from the top.  Some miles to the north is another prominent, larger monadnock with a fire tower – Paris Mountain.  When I was around eight years old I did get to climb up the steps, but never made it into the cab at the top.  I distinctly remember the trap door being padlocked when we got to the top.

I had forgotten all about the towers until just this past week.  I had been looking for locations to do long-exposure photographs of I-85 for traffic trails when I spotted the Duncan lookout tower on the way home from work on Friday.  At the intersection of Danzler and Victor Hill Roads it had a perfect view of the Interstate, so I went to explore.  I found the tower in the front yard of a house on Victor Hill Road.  The fence around its base now had a dog house within, and it was clear that the tower had not been used in years.  I gave up on using this location as a photography platform, but now I wanted to learn more about the towers themselves, so a new quest was born. (more…)