Judy and I went for one of our walks in the “Icky Woods” again today. The owner of the campground here on Lake Hartwell gave us a challenge. We had asked about bicycling and hiking opportunities and were told about limited opportunities. But then he told us that he and his family had hiked down to the stream that crosses their property. He told about walking up the stream to its source, a spring. He also indicated that it was a very difficult hike because of thorny brush and some steep banks. Well that was all the challenge we needed. The trail down to the stream is wide enough for their 4 wheeler. We came upon a wonderful beaver pond. We started hiking through the brush up the stream and found another beaver dam and pond. This one had a beautiful cascading spillway in it, and gurgled with delight. We worked our way around this pond and yes there was another dam and pond above it. The leaves have mostly fallen from the trees and are dry and crunchy under foot, so we must have sounded like a heard of elephants coming through the forest.

After negotiating about eight or ten of these ponds we stopped on a grassy knoll and just drank in the serenity of the area. We sat quietly for 20 minutes hoping to see some sign of the beavers, but nothing moved. Eventually we continued our exploration and reached the very spring that fed the stream. You could actually walk around the end of the stream and go down the other side.

Finally we retraced our steps and returned to the pathway down from the campground. We then decided to follow the stream on down to the lake. We found two or three more beaver dams along this stretch of the stream. We eventually made our way to the lake beach and found ourselves right back to the launch ramp where we had canoed two days earlier.

It was really interesting to see how the beavers constructed their dams. We only found one mound that would probably qualify as a beaver lodge. Is it possible that one family of beavers have created this series of dams, perhaps as many as sixteen, along a half mile stretch of creek? Some of the dams were no more than 12 inches high, others were six foot or more.

At no time did we get more than half a mile from the campground, but this was a delightful walk in the “Icky Woods” Below are a couple photos from our walk.

Good Bye again from South Carolina, and Judy and I send our love to all our friends and relatives everywhere.