Since I was camped at the Goose Creek State Park I though I might as well see what Goose Creek itself looked like. The radio station was saying today was going to be in the 90's and I could well believe that.
Goose Creek flows into the Pamlico River 9 miles (by road) from Washington and is actually a couple of hundred feet wide at the put in. Some creek. I put in at the end of the primitive camp sites at the park. I didn't want to do anything adventurous today. I'm using my backup paddle and it weighs a ton. I had a little trouble getting away from shore too. The blades are very flexible and bent a lot when I tried to push off so I had to rock my way into deeper water.
Out on the water I turned right (east) to go up Goose Creek. Right away I could feel the extra weight of the cheap metal shafted paddle. I quickly spotted a couple of osprey flying around and perched on dead cypress trees draped in Spanish moss as a 5-10 knot wind pushed me upstream. The dead cypress trees would tell me these waters are becoming more brackish. Unlike mangroves, cypress trees do not like salt in their waters and quickly die off when it happens.
A combination of pines and hardwoods and marsh grass lined both shores along with the dead cypress. This is also supposed to be the northern end of the range for alligators. I really don't expect to see any of them for a while yet. Lots of fish could be seen and heard jumping. Lots of turtle (or cottonmouth) heads could be seen poking up out of the water to see what was going on.
Goose Creek forks at its far end. I followed the left fork which narrowed to 20-30 feet. I heard lots of plopping as turtles hit the water at my approach. I saw the first palmettos during this trip south.
The left fork narrowed even more to 10-15 feet. Then I saw the first cypress trees still alive. Many scraggly live oaks leaned out across the fork too making paddling more difficult so I turned back.
A short way up the right fork produced more live cypress trees. I spotted a small lizard swimming or running across the water for all it was worth. It was churning up a lot of water and making quite a commotion for a little critter its size. Thinking something would surely have it for lunch I scooped it up in my hand. The little bugger ran up my arm, across my face, down the other arm and jumped back in the water. Oh, well! You're on your own now, little guy. I also scared up a blue heron and a duck.
I had ducked under a couple of downed pines but that was getting old in a hurry so I turned back with plenty of water to paddle in and noticed more palmettos on the way back. Once back on the more open water I got the 10 knot wind directly in the face. That along with the heavy paddle had my shoulders aching by the time I got back to the put in so I had lunch and called it quits for the day.