Congaree National Park

Thursday, February 19, 2026

We got up and went out the door! Off to Congaree National Park we went. Huzzah for doing something!

As the day went by, I actually thought of a bunch of titles for today’s blog:
From Dick Pond Road past Gravelly Gully Circle around Hendrick’s Shortcut to Pudding Swamp we went!
Luckily, the directions to Congaree did not involve any major highways. We got to toodle through real South Carolina. There were lots and lots of ramshackle shacks (is that redundant) (most definitely not inhabited, but some…?) neighboring beautiful brick mansions. It seemed odd until it didn’t. It was cloudy driving west in the morning, but the glorious sun had us backlit the whole way home – beautiful.
Best Grits Ever?!
Sumpter was the town for lunch. We stopped in an Arby’s parking lot on the edge of town and looked at our phones. I said we should follow Mike and Mary’s rule to never eat in a chain restaurant on a road trip. We read a lot of good menus and decided on Jeffrey Lampkin’s Country Boy Kitchen. When we got there, it was empty. Um. That is not encouraging. We sat down and read the menu. It had names of things – I eventually chose the Harriet – with no descriptions. Keith cleverly picked the salmon and gouda grits – to be different from the usual shrimp and grits that he loves so much. A couple takeout people came. Two single men came. We waited a while. Finally out food came. Keith took one bite and said wow. Another bite. WOW. These might be the best grits I’ve ever had. He continued alternating that statement with mmm mmmm throughout the meal until he scraped every morsel of food from the bowl. My food was very good, too!

Snakes and Gators!
I read all about the national park over the past couple of days and the possibilities of snakes and gators. WTH. I didn’t even know alligators lived in South Carolina. I was less concerned about the gators than I was reading about the snakes. Snakes are sneaky and suddenly they are there and you are screaming and running and the whole situation is bad. We were at a traffic light and Keith said what are you thinking (he says that a lot and I always tell him, then he says what? why? I always think he should just stop asking) and answered honestly, “Snakes and Gators!” He looked everywhere for a sign. There was no sign. I was just thinking that if snakes were suddenly there, I would scream and run and likely run toward an alligator, because that would be my luck, and he asked. We ended up seeing no snakes or gators. We did see a snapping turtle that crawled out of the leaves, making a lot of rustly sounds so we knew to look. We stopped to see what others were looking at several times and it was a squirrel. Seriously. A squirrel. Are there places without squirrels that these people could have come from? I said there are black, red, and grey squirrels in my yard – hardly a thing. One lady said that is how she feels about deer. Where are there plentiful deer and no squirrels? I do not know. One group was looking at something they thought was a brown smudgy (that might not have been the name. It was something brown) It was a bird and they weren’t sure where it was. I walked on. If it wasn’t a gator or a snake, I kinda wasn’t there for it.

It was trees
Congaree is a relatively small national park. I had never heard of it before we tried planning an eastern road trip in 2021. We figured since we had gone west and seen amaaaaazing parks in Utah and Arizona the previous year, we would do east parks next. We ended up just going to DC and back, so no Congaree. It is three hours (because they are little roads with a fair number of stops and a fair amount of traffic. Until you get to nowhere, then you are just kinda going on your own on bumpy roads). It is an old growth forest with the tallest trees in the east (you just kinda think hey people – you got nothing on redwoods, but they did say east, so you are, like, okay. There is something important about being in a flood plain. The whole thing floods every year – feet and feet of water and the trees are okay with it. The whole place was trees, and trees, and trees.

Happy Trails!
They have lots of trails, but the major one is a 3 mile boardwalk right outside the visitor center. The west side was closed, because it is gone. It just looked like mud. I assume they are going to build a new one. We walked (hiked!) about 3/4 of the part that was open, then gave up and went back. It was just trees. It was a nice hike on a boardwalk, but to be honest the 74 degrees was warm and I was thirsty (the signs said BRING ENOUGH WATER. We brought none. It was not enough) and everything looked the same. It was trees.

Loblolly
Fun to say! The Loblolly pine trees are the tallest trees they have – about 170 feet tall. That is pretty tall. It’s hard to know how tall a tree is if someone doesn’t tell you. Luckily, they told us. I was more interested in seeing Cypress trees knees. They are the pointy growing dealies that surround Cypress. Scientists don’t know why they exist (maybe to help keep the tree balanced?), but I like them.

Thank you for your service!
I want to say that to every service person, because I really am thankful for them and so impressed by them. I usually don’t say it because I wonder if it is weird or intrusive or whatever and I am afraid to do something wrong. I never, ever, ever considered someone saying it to me. I was proudly wearing my MN/home T-shirt and my Rebel Loon button today, just in case anyone wanted to ask about the siege of Minneapolis. I stopped to look at some water over the railing and a woman said, “Thank you for your service.” My head swiveled because she was looking right at me, but must not have been talking to me. She laughed and said she had in-laws in MN and knew how bad it has been and appreciated me wearing my stuff outside the state. I told her I was super proud of MN but hadn’t actually done anything myself beyond financial aid. She said she was glad I was safe and willing to help in any way. I want to go home and hold up a sign.

I saw a leaf stuff in a web or something on the way out. I thought it looked like a hummingbird.

Squint