On Saturday, October
10, I went for a walk (actually, it felt like
a hike) sponsored by the Asheville Amblers Walking
Club through the only National Park in South Carolina.
It was a case of everything coming together. I
had been walking for exercise since we moved from
Maryland, but wasn't’t doing it on a regular
basis. On July 3, I decided I would walk every
day for 100 days. As it turned out, the one-hundredth
day was the day for the big walk/hike. The week
before I had watched the Ken Burns National Parks
documentary on PBS and I had just started reading
a biography of John Muir and here I was.
Early that morning I drove down to the park
and found the check-in table. Club members explained
to me what Volkswalking was all about and how
I could get credit for my walks and receive
pins and certificates and meet cool folks. I
stowed my paperwork in the car and stepped out
in to the woods for an 11-kilometer adventure.
Congaree National Park is a floodplain forest
made up of many varieties of trees and other
plant life. The predominant tree is the bald
cypress and there are some of record sizes.
My path took me first along an elevated boardwalk
that runs for a little over a mile through a
swampy environment. At the end of the boardwalk,
the trail runs through thick forest and crosses,
via wooden bridges, Cedar Creek that winds through
the park. After about five miles of walking
and taking many photographs, I arrived at another
section of the boardwalk and found my way back
to the starting point. I was hot and tired,
but I had experienced and seen many new and
wonderful things.
