December Hiking at Sanford's San-Lee Park

When a warmer-than-usual December affords an

opportunity to spend time outdoors, Judy and I jump

at the chance. Maybe we don't jump so high, any more.

Anyway, a sunny, mild Thursday led us to Sanford's

San-Lee Park, where we had been a couple of times, 

but several years ago. The park's message board displayed

a wide range of activities, including a summer camp,

boat rentals (in season), two hiking trails around two

magnificent ponds, and an 11 or 12 mile mountain bike

trail. There's also a brand new nature center with an

impressive display of North Carolina snakes and more.

The original nature center had been housed in Lee County's

old water treatment plant, but it burned a few years ago.

Let's start our tour.

Judy and Ken on the long bridge between the two large ponds.

This North Carolina beaver is stuffed, mounted, and masked.

Here's some info about the park's bike trail.

View of the upper pond or lake.

Across the lake, a different view.

Here are a couple of tree huggers. So to speak.

But it turns out one of these trees is dead!

The dogwood trunk is hollow and can only stand

with the support of its neighbor.

What a tragic end to this romance.

We stuck to the hiking trails, but were near the biking

trails at many points. There were far more bikers

than hikers this day.

There were several rustic foot bridges along our route.

One plant that thrives year round is Christmas fern.

There were abundant specimens all along our path.

Our trail was a maze of tree roots, and at times I 

wished we had brought our hiking poles. But we had

no falls. We wondered what the bike trails were like.

At the headwaters of the stream-fed lake.

What was lacking in color was made up for with

interesting specimens like this fungus.

We saw numerous colonies of Wild Ginger all along

the way. They no longer had the "pignut" flowers

that are present in early spring.

Now we saw that tons of red clay had been brought

in for the bike trails. That solved the problem of

roots and stones that were on the hiking trail.

We saw bikers zooming and hooting and hollering

on these parallel trails.

We saw several bikers near here, as our trail turned

back toward our starting point.

As we followed the lake's shore, we were treated to

this lovely family of ducks on an outing of their own.

We hiked parts of both of these trails.

This is a place where bikers can cross, but we didn't

see any attempt it.

As we neared the park's playground, we saw this

nice man-made waterfall below the much larger dam

of the old reservoir.

You might find this sound soothing. Try it out.

We thought we'd finished our sight-seeing, but

Judy spotted this late autumn Carolina Anole (sometimes

called a chameleon, but not the same thing). A chemical

change transforms them from brown to green and back again

for protective camouflage.

If you have FOUR seconds, you can watch him disappear.

Judy and I heartily recommend that you take advantage

of any suitable late fall or winter days to take an outing

of your own. There are marvelous parks and trails all

over our state, with more all the time. It's good for the

body and the spirit. Let me know about your next adventure!