We got up on Wednesday knowing we had to get to Columbia, SC about 4 hours away. There were several possible stops on the way and we figured we would just see how it went as once again - the forecast was rain and storms. Ugh. Our first stop was in the eastern side of GSMNP in the Cosby area - we figured we would do the easy 1 mile nature loop.
Loved it - we were the only ones there and this was obviously a less visited part of the park. Very lush and green - Spring had already started here unlike the higher elevations we had been at the days before.
Second stop - the Carl Sandburg Home. We didn't really think this would be interesting, but again - loved it. I wish we would have had time to do the tour of the home, but we arrived at a time when the next tour wasn't for another hour - so we just toured the grounds outside the home on our own.
The property was amazingly beautiful.
We probably could have easily spent another hour here.
The best part of it was the Goat farm.
We got to play with the baby goats...
A volunteer ranger talked to us quiet a bit about them - we enjoyed it.
Next stop - Cowpens National Battlefield. The visitor center was small - I wish we would have had time to see the video.
We walked the 1 mile battlefield loop trail.
It was nice.
The memorial was in front of the visitor center. Again - take a look at the skies...not so bad. We decided to put on our running shoes and run the 3.5 mile autoloop. We played our game of guess the number of hikers...but changed it to cars since we were on the autoloop. It ended up being rather funny because we saw zero cars...but a few runners, hikers, and dog walkers...apparently, a lot of people did what we were doing. It was a nice running loop with a pedestrian way on the pavement.
I would have liked to spend more time at this park, it was well set up with a lot to see and learn.
It was at Kings Military when we first heard about the search and rescue that happened at Conagree National Park the days before. We had originally planned our trip to see Conagree first, but when we found out the visitor center wasn't open on Sundays and Mondays, we completely switched the vacation around so we would visit Conagree on Thursday when it was open. WHAT A GOOD THING WE DID! A father and two kids got lost in the park starting on Saturday night...they ended up closing the park completely on Monday for search and rescue operations. I'll write more about it all on Day 5. Anyhow, the ranger helped take plan in the SAR efforts. He told us where the people got lost/found and more about the rescue. He told us we would probably be fine on the trail that we had picked (which happened to be where the people got lost), but that we needed to be smart about it. I had done some previous research on hiking there and contacted the rangers via email, so I did know what we were in for and had brought the GPS and printed out maps. The ranger gave us a good suggestion that at any point, if we didn't see the next marker, one of us should stay at the known marker while the other looks for the next...that way, we could always turn around if need be. We ended up using this method a few times the next day! I am glad we got to hear all of this prior to arriving at Conagree - for when we got there, the visitor center was closed and we just started hiking!
Anyhow, we obviously made it to Columbia, SC that night. We had a nice dinner at a local brewery in the downtown area. We were able to walk the grounds of the capitol complex and also through the South Carolina campus. Upon getting back to the hotel, it was a mad house. Why so busy on a Wednesday night? Rob figured it out in the morning...a graduation at Fort Jackson. While crowded, the hotel was still quiet and worked out fine.
2 comments:
That looks like a lot of exploration of a beautiful and historic area. Nice photos!
You covered a lot of ground. Looks like the weather gods were with you once again.
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