Date: December 1, 2024
Place: Congaree Nastional Park, South Carolina
Coordinates: 33.829573, -80.823754
Length: 3.7 miles both walks
Level: easy
When I suggested going to the Southeast on our 2024 Thanksgiving family vacation I had my mind set on Savannah, Georgia (yes, yes, because of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil), but we ended up spending the first half of our vacation time in Charleston. When we moved to Savannah for the second half we got to hike some more in South Carolina - where the Savannah National Wildlife Refuge and the Pinckney Island National Wildlife Refuge are. After that we spend a good couple of days exploring the town of Savannah, going on a downtown historic tour and a river tour and a couple of house museum tours (including the Mercer House, of course), and a very interesting visit at the Pin Point Heritage Museum, dedicated to the oldest community of Gullah-Geechee black land owners.
We did try to go on a couple of nature hikes that didn't work out (on one occasion the preserves was closed, and on the other, at Fort Pulaski, the mosquitoes were insanely impossible (in November! can't imagine how it is like in the summer there) so we turned tail. So it happened that we left Savannah without having a single hike worth writing about in the State of Georgia.
Our flight back home from Charlotte was in the afternoon. Thinking of making the best of our last day we decided to spend the night before in Columbia, which is half way between Savannah and Charlotte, and spend the morning before the flight at Congaree National Park.
It was relatively warm in Charleston and in Savannah, but in Columbia it was pretty cold. We drove to the Harry Hampton Visitor center and after taking some information there we bundled ourselves in our warm jackets, took our cameras and started on the boardwalk hike into the forest.
The first thing that grabbed my attention at Congaree was that fall was much further along than at he coastal region. Many of the trees were already winter-bare and others were wearing their fall colors. Some of the trees were still green though, and I wasn't sure if they were evergreen or just late in getting the memo.
The boardwalk had a nice mosaic of fall colored discarded leaves. The leaves rustled softly when we stepped on them.
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| Boardwalk |
Almost as soon as we got on the boardwalk we were treated to our first bird of the hike, and what a treat that was! A pileated woodpecker, very close, out in the open! What an impressive bird he was!
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| Pileated Woodpecker |
In California the tallest trees are conifers. Most broad leaf trees never get as tall. The trees in Congaree however, rose to very impressive heights. Not redwood heights of course, but neck-breaking heights nonetheless.
The next woodpecker was just around the corner - a yellow-bellied sapsucker that hid in a large groove hole in a tree trunk.
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| Yellow-bellied Sapsucker |
Below the boardwalk the ground was dry in places, and in other places it was flooded. Sallow, leaf-covered standing water patches filled the spaces between the tree trunks.
In areas where the soil was dry the boardwalk came really close to the ground. There was hardly any undergrowth in the drier parts of the forest, just a thick mat of leaves and humus.
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| Congaree National Park |
The squirrels were very active on the forest floor. We saw many of them, digging between the leaves, chewing on things, or running up and down the trees. They didn't mind our presence and completely disregarded us. They were too busy stocking for winter.
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| Eastern Gray Squirrel |
There were areas that were dry the time of our visit, but were clearly flooded on other times for significant time lengths. These were area populated by the swamp native bald cypress trees, which we were already familiar with from our trip's first hike at Audubon's Beidler Forest Sanctuary. Even without looking up at the canopy, the bald cypress' 'knees' gave them away.
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| Bald Cypress' 'Knees' |
The 'knees' are these buttresses that protrude from the ground and are thought to function as 'snorkels' that allow the trees' roots to get oxygen when flooded. Some of these 'knees' looked more like fists thrust into the air.
My experience with swamp forests was limited to Audubon's Beidler Forest Sanctuary in which we hiked on the first day of our trip. The bogs, or flooded swamp areas, used to cover huge areas in the southeast, very little of which remain today.
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| Congaree National Park |
These trees support not only themselves but also other plants that take a ride and live at a higher level, having sprouted in a tree hole.
For certain vine plants it is a strategy, to use the support of tree trunks in order to get the sunlight at the canopy level.
Since many of the trees were already bare and those that weren't had their canopies so high, we could actually see the little forest birds. We saw a number of wrens that day.
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| Carolina Wren |
There were many woodpeckers in the forest and the sound of tree knocking was all around us. Occasionally we got to see the percussionists as well.
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| Downy Woodpecker |
The
trees in the forest were definitely new to me. The forest itself was
very lovely and calm. It was an old growth forest, but it had a very
different air than the old growth forests of the west coast, even the
deciduous ones. The east was once covered with vast deciduous forests, nearly all of which was lost to logging and agricultural clearing. The leftover bits of the old growth forests are now like tiny islands, remnants of a now lost world.
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| Congaree National Park |
We passed a wide fire lane and continued in the boardwalk on the other side. There we were once again walking above a flooded area of the forest. The waster was standing still and a mat of fallen leaves dotted the surface. This was a picture that I've seen many times in movies and in illustrations, but now I was seeing this serene autumn beauty with my own eyes.
The water may have been calm but there was bustling wildlife activity in the trees all over the place. The squirrels were very active, but so were the birds.
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| Hermit Thrush |
We stopped there for a good long time to observe all the little birds that were busy down the low branches and on the fallen logs and at the bases of the trees above the water.
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| White-throated Sparrow |
The birds were surprisingly quiet. Other that the knocking of the woodpeckers, all the activity sounds were leaf rustling. There was no singing or twitting going on as there would have been in spring. The birds weren't courting or establishing territories.
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| Blue-headed Vireo |
All the migratory birds were already long gone and the birds we were seeing were the permanent residents. They were gathering food and adding to their fat reserves in preparation for winter.
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| Winter wren |
One of the birds was going in and out of a hole at the base of a bald cypress' trunk. I don't know if it was finding food or stashing food there. I assume it was the first because it didn't seem like a good idea to stash food in a place that was likely to be submerged when winter rains raised the water level there.
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| Tufted Titmouse |
Stopping to observe the birds certainly slowed down our walk, but it was time well spent. It was good being in the forest. I could easily spend much longer time there. It helped of course, that the weather was nice and cool, and that there were no mosquitoes at the time.
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| Congaree National Park |
We reached an open body of water. The Weston Lake, as it was called, was a deeper and wider segment of a slough, one of many sloughs that run through the forest and feed the swamp area when the water rises. It looked as if the water was standing there too but a more attentive look revealed that the water was, in fact, flowing, albeit very slowly.
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| Weston Lake |
The calm, seemingly non-moving water surface mirrored perfectly the trees on the banks. I could tell each separate leaf with its perfect color and shape in the water image. It might be cliche in the movies but in reality it is beauty itself.
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| Reflection |
We couldn't go on any further. The trail, we were told at the visitor center, was damaged by storms and was closed. What otherwise would have been a loop trail was no an in-and-out trail.
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| Trail End |
I didn't mind returning on the same path. There were still more things to see, and more birds introduced themselves on the return walk.
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| Red-headed Woodpecker |
One of these birds I didn't see myself - my family birders saw it but by the time I caught up with them, the black and white warbler was already gone. I am happy that I got to see it last month in Texas on a vacation trip with Pappa Quail.
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| Black and White Warbler |
The time was nearing mid-day and the illumination that penetrated the forest canopy was more intense, shining back from the pools and making the fall colors stand out much better.
A northern flicker flicked by. It's a bird that is very familiar to us from California, but that individual bird's colors looked more intense to me.
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| Northern Flicker |
We walked back fairly quickly, pausing only when we heard movements around us. These were usually squirrels, but whenever it was a bird we would stop and look for it.
Whenever my family birders would be searching the trees around us I would have more time to take a closer look at other beautiful fall sights, such as a quilt of autumn leaves on a fallen log.
The reflections of the bog pools were also beautiful to see. I took many photos that day, and took many refreshing breaths of clean old growth forest air.
The boardwalk rose high above the ground as we approached the visitor center again. The trees seemed more dense there too. Other park visitors which just arrived were heading out on the same trail we were returning from.
We still had time though, so after a short break we decided to go out on a second walk, to go down the loop arm that we couldn't return on because of the trail damage. We didn't have time to walk all the way to where the trail was closed but we did get about half a mile into it.
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| 1 mile |
During our short break at the visitor center area the clouds started gathering and the sunlight dimmed. The forest looked a bit less cheerful now.
Of the few evergreen plants in the forest the most prominent one was the Christmas Jewel holly. These bushes grow to considerable heights although they don't compete with the trees. Fall time is where they can get the extra photosynthesis, not being shaded by the forest canopy.
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| Common Holly |
Smaller trees also had their chance of extra photosynthesis time, but even them were already far along in losing their on leaves.
That extra short walk we went on was also rewarding in terms of birding. We definitely got to see more birds on that loop arm, including more woodpeckers.
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| Red-headed Woodpecker |
We got to see the prized pileated woodpecker again. This time he was doing some acrobatics, trying to get berries hanging at the end of a twig.
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| Pileated Woodpecker |
Active below the boardwalk were also very familiar birds, which Pappa Quail hardly bothers with anymore. The elder chika however, got some nice shots of them as well.
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| Ruby-crowned Kinglet |
Even the very common American robin got his place in my chika's bird photo collection. I love seeing the robins even on the other side of the continent.
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| American Robin |
Eventually it was time to turn around and walk back, we had a flight to catch. I said goodbye to this fascinating, beautiful forest, hoping I'll get to see it again, perhaps in a different season. We summed up another wonderful family vacation. Now that the chikas are fledging, who knows when the next one will be.
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| Congaree National Park |
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