This week my brother and I took the canoe up to the end of our slough.  A creek feeds into the lake there,  winding it’s way  through cyprus trees and grasses, then on back into the hills.

Want to come along?  Here we go!

I loved the shapes of the cyprus tree trunks…and the reflections.

It was fascinating how the dappled light played along the water and the trunks.

When we were inside a circle of cyprus trees I imagined what a great camp site this would be. – till I remembered that I was floating on 3 feet of water.

Then we paddled further upstream.

The creek began to narrow…

…and there were more branches overhead and below the surface.  We were taking lots of pictures…

…and we realized it was dark enough in there that our flash would go off.  Hmmm….wonder what that would look like?

The photo above is of grape vine roots.  The vine is above and the roots have grown down to the creek.  They didn’t show up well till I used the flash.  Very cool!  And even more spooky looking!

Now Diana, I know what you’re thinking…”there could be snakes in there!”  And you’d be right, but we didn’t see any, and trust me I was looking!

Eventually we couldn’t go any further upstream, so we edged ourselves around.  The trip downstream went much faster, as I had already broken through all the spider webs! LOL

Back through the cyprus trees,

with a look at their seedpods…

…and back out into the open water…complete with sunshine!

It was a really fun adventure, and reminded me of a time several years ago when the same brother and I paddled up another creek on this lake, but we did it after dark.  With no lights shining.  The sounds of the bugs (and tigers and grizzly bears and monsters) were SO LOUD I was totally freaked out and finally, even after my brother told me not to, turned on my flashlight to realize there was nothing there.  No giant snake ready to drop from the trees, no scary bug weighing at least 10 pounds ready to fly in my face!  I still laugh (sort of) when I think of that adventure.  This one was much more sedate.

But then – we’re much older now.