Our Wild Life at Magnolia Springs State Park

When we made the travel arrangements for Denisa's Mother, we found cheaper airline tickets flying into Augusta, Georgia, rather than Savannah. Knowing that we would make another trip to Augusta to take her back to that airport, it was smart to move the motor home in that direction. We thought Betty would enjoy experiencing what we do each time we relocate the motor home. So we disconnected the water and electricity, put in the slides dumped the tanks, and drove an hour and a half down the road. Betty sat in the front passenger seat to get the view out of that big wind shield. It rained a little on the trip, but Mark thinks that's just a free car wash on the road.

It stopped raining by the time we arrived, and we had another nice driveway going into our new home. Our new camp site is in another Georgia state park--Magnolia Springs. So it is fitting that our new driveway is lined by magnolia trees.

They are just beginning to bloom in this area. These trees are covered in buds, and they are going to be spectacular soon in their full flowering splendor.

We also found these furry critters under the row of trees. At first we didn't know if they were part of a plant or an animal. They look like furry goose down, but they are actually the bud coverings for those magnolia blooms.

Now that we have seen the magnolias at the entrance, we went to see the spring on the Magnolia Springs park nature trail. We could see the deep source of the turquoise spring, producing seven million gallons of crystal clear water per day.

Now that we have seen the magnolias and spring of Magnolia Springs State Park, we are ready for the "wild life" to begin. As we stood on the observation deck, we noticed that turtles started swimming our way from every direction. Obviously used to being fed off the deck, we counted 48 turtles that approached the deck. Most of them were around 12 inches in size, and we noticed that many of the turtles' shells were covered with moss from hanging out on the edge of the spring.

A late-comer turtle approached from the far side of the pond. He was noticeably bigger in size and had different markings from the rest of the turtles. As he approached the deck, one of the other turtles suddenly attacked him, latching onto the fin of the larger turtle and refusing to let go. We watched the underwater struggle, wondering how long turtles can hold their breath. Eventually, the bully turtle did let go and the unusual turtle swam quickly away, again to the far side of the pond. Watching nature is always interesting to us, and we learned there are bullies in every species.

From the observation deck, we headed over the bridge. It's nice to have more couple shots since Denisa's Mother is here with her camera.

From the bridge, we headed into the forest for a hike down the nature trail. At 86, Betty hasn't been hiking for many, many years. But escorted by Mark, she made it a good distance down the trail over those tree roots and leaves.

With the wild life we lead, we also spent some time at the lake every day. The water in the lake looked like glass, with just one curious bump.

That would be the snout of one of the resident alligators. Like the turtles, we noticed that they swam to the fishing pier when we arrived. It looks like someone has been feeding the gators too. We had planned to kayak on this pretty little lake. But we had second thoughts about being in an inflatable boat in the middle of a lake full of gators that see people as a good source of food.

Betty watched the alligator in the bottom left of the picture below, analyzing how fast she would have to move if that gator headed her way.

We had plenty of opportunities to meet the resident gators, as they would glide through the water lilies at the edge of the lake.

We posed in front of those beautifully blooming water lilies on the last morning we were there.

There were nice benches to sit and watch the blooming lilies around the edge of the lake. What a nice place to relax, surrounded by water and water lilies!

But this morning, the bench was already taken.

As if we hadn't been wild enough at Magnolia Springs, we noticed an interesting rope-like thing in the camp site next door. It looked like a perfectly kinked rope. But we realized it was live snake, lying perfectly still with that unusual posture.

As we watched the snake for a few minutes, it suddenly straightened to a more normal look.

We watched as he slithered down off the camping site platform. Mark would work his google magic, and discovered that we had just witnessed a rat snake's natural reaction to fear. When he feels threatened, he assumes a kinked posture and remains motionless.

So Betty got to experience moving the motor home and setting up camp in a new place. She also got to sample campfire food. One evening Mark built a fire, and we cooked out bratwurst and smores for dinner. We wanted Betty to experience all parts of our wild life on the road!