Chitcot State Park Louisiana

You can’t  win them all. We decided to drive 45 minutes off course in order to visit Chitcot SP. it is said to have a beautiful Arboretum, a very nice bass fishing lake and extensive trail system. And that’s all true. Unfortunately, in the middle of December during a rain storm, it just didn’t work out for us. 

It took us three tries to find a campsite that was level enough for us to work with so after motoring around in the dark, we finally arrived at our spot. Within minutes I was getting bit by mosquitoes . (during summer this must be horrendous) . We were basically spending the night in a swamp. There was standing water everywhere. 

That night we received news of the passing of one of my closest cousins so we changed course and decided to head north back to St. Louis. 

The weather change from rainy and wet to cold and rainy and wet. We figured we would probably make it all the way to mid-Arkansas by tomorrow evening where the low temperature was 26. 

Time to re-winterize the Pup

We finished in record time leaving me time to try and fish. The water was muddy, the banks soft and squishy. But what really made me give up after three casts was not so much the fact that I wasn’t getting any bites. That didn’t surprise me, the water Looked like dark chocolate milk. It was the alligator sign warning about the abundance of reptile activity. 

We had been seeing signs for alligators all over Florida,Alabama and  Mississippi. What got me moving out was the alligator slide that was no more than a few feet from where I was standing. An alligator slide looks like a well worn path in the mud. It is a worn rut that kinda looks  like somebody had repeatedly dragged a fifty pound bags of gravel toward the water. 

Damp leaves were everywhere, in both Vicki and my hair, all over the car, falling from nearby trees; but I didn’t see any on the alligator slide. It was close. I would say it had slid down into the water no longer than five minutes ago and more than likely WE SCARED IT INTO THE WATER AND NOW IT WAS MAD. 

We left in a hurry heading straight north.