South Toledo Bend to Jimmie Davis

Gosh, the time just zipped by us in S. Toledo Bend. For the Thorntons this has been the best park so far, although David liked Grand Isle quite a bit. Dee and Paul liked the Gulf but prefer Saint Joseph Island. We're thinking maybe further down the coast of Texas, South Padre Island, is a strong possibility for next year.

After we got through the weekend at South Toledo Bend, most folks cleared out of the campground leaving us with a much quieter place and lake (there had been many kids here, as last week was school vacation in Texas). These mid week times in popular local campgrounds are the best times because there are fewer people and you just have more the the place to yourself.

Canada Geese in a quiet area of the lake

The lake was loaded with coots when we arrived and yesterday we noticed that there many fewer of their little black bodies bobbing up and down. Their migration north must have begun now. They are residents here but they do go all the way up into Canada. And speaking of Canada...we have seen two nesting pairs of Canada Geese. We are much more used to seeing them fly overhead or standing around a small pond in the Virginia area leaving behind a lot of goose poop, so to see them in a wild state is really pretty cool. We should have given you a "spoiler" alert as this blog will be a lot about the wonderful birds we have seen and heard.

Paul and David enjoy the fire and a "brew"

The fire and the wine enjoyed by Dee and Marty

We have heard and seen lots of birds including cedar waxwings, brown thrashers, chickadees, all sorts of LBBs (little brown birds), coots by the thousands, white pelicans (flying overhead), great blue herons, blue-winged teals, egrets, various woodpeckers and the list goes on. The birds singing in the morning and really all day long have been such a treat to our ears. We don't think we've been at such a bird song filled park ever before and it is not because folks are feeding them, they are just here! And yes, and there have been some kingfishers too!

This magnificent Great Blue flew right by us during a paddle

We should note that pollen has been everywhere. Each day and in fact several times a day we have had to wipe the stuff off. It is just amazing. Even Muki the Thornton's smaller cat has been affected by all the pollen in the air and had several sneezing fits while in this park.

This is one of three or four fish this egret caught while we sat quietly in the kayak

Our first and only rain in a week came on Tuesday night into Wednesday, washing away a lot of the pollen. We packed up on Wednesday morning and headed upstate to Jimmie Davis State Park which is on Caney Lake. It is another lovely spot and one that if we were to return to this area we would put on our list of places to stay. The camp spots are larger, all seem pretty flat, and nearly all have some kind of view of the water. There is easy access to the lake pretty much from any site if you have a kayak.

Jimmie Davis SP seems to be primarily used by fishermen looking for bass.  The lake holds Louisiana's record for bass: 16 pounds.  Late Thursday afternoon we got the first of a local church group that is having a gathering here.  They are a group of a dozen or two and spend the local school vacation period for fishing, eating and socializing.  One of the features of this park is the presence of five dormitory-style buildings, each of which has probably 20 rooms, and rent out to groups.  They each have basic cooking facilities, cable TV, internet, and beautiful grounds with a lake view.  We don't know if any state parks in the northeast US offer such facilities.

This is a great older building we saw in the town of Many on the way to Caney Lake

There are not as many birds in this park as in South Toledo Bend, but we've already seen two we'd not seen before: pied-billed grebes and a lovely little Carolina wren.

Another wonderful campground sign.

Pied-billed Grebe (we only saw these little guys on Wednesday late afternoon.

We're here just one more night and then headed over toward Vicksburg, where we'll spend two nights near the Civil War battlefields, soaking up some history as well as watching some basketball on TV. Gotta keep our priorities right...history and basketball.

March Madness has also begun so we are taking advantage of some cooler weather to watch games during the day.