Stewards of the White Oak River Basin

Julia Miner of Araphoe is leading the charge onto the lake. We marked the entrance so we could find it on our way back. Doug Toltzman of Hubert used his GPS too and we had compasses. In bad weather do not come here.

Elmer Eddy of Swansboro and Jim Niedermeyer of Hubert getting ready to launch at the end of the six mile dirt road to the lake. We passed scores of deer Hunters with dogs. The largest deer hunt we ever saw. On our way out they told us they shot three deer. Season is all over in a few days.

This is Elmer's photo of Julia looking across the expanse of the Great Lake. This was taken in the morning, while the water was still calm. (photo by Elmer)

This is our lunch stop. A sandy beach was around the next point! But we had a good time here in the woods. The woods here were actually open so you could walk through them.

Scenes you don't see anywhere else.

Look at that tree on the right. The water level seems to be about a foot below normal.

A leaning cypress. See the sandy beach in the background.

The vastness is overwhelming. The bottom is hard as rock. Must be a hard clay. We hit it with our paddles as we went along all around he entire lake.

This is a mountain range!

The cypress on this lake are entirely different from what we see on our White Oak River.
They seem to grow on legs! And they seem to be stunted and turned into to grotesque shapes.
We must come back in the springtime and see what the look like then.

These cypress on the north east quadrant of the lake seem to be larger and straiter.

How vast and spacious!

These are way out in the lake far from shore.

More of the same.

They are all over the place on this side of the lake.

Elmer and Jim paddling along. Well, Jim is paddling anyway.

We came on two baby ducks like this. They couldn't or wouldn't fly. We saw a whole flock of large ducks. But very little other bird life except for song birds. Sorry, we lost the picture of the immature duck. Maybe we can get it back in later.

Rounding the last point toward the our take out we thought. We got there after three more points.

Julia unloading and our trash collection in the canoe. Yes we picked up two empty Deer Corn bags and a crate and a lounge chair and a few cans and bottles.

With the exception of Elmer's photo of Julia on the calm water, all of the photos up to this point were take by Doug Toltzman.

It was a most unusual and interesting day on the water. It stayed calm all day.

We are sorry to have to close with a very sad commentary. Litter and trash have found it's way into this pristine wilderness. There was very little around the lake shoreline being two empty bags of Deer Corn and a plastic crate and a few bottle and cans. A canvas and aluminum lounge
chair,( We bet he was asleep when the ducks came by!).

Most of the trash we picked up today was at the parking area and launching area and dock. We walked down a road to the north and it is lined with trash. This is despicable and needs to be removed. It has no place in this beautiful wilderness, our very own Croatan National Forest.

To add to this, the toilet facilities constructed here have been severely vandalized and is unusable. The door has been shot many times and the door handle has been broken off.

This is a National disgrace. We have got to learn to take care of our very own National Forest.

Here is the GPS plot of our journey. The lake portion of our trip was 9 miles, according to the geosychronous satellites.

Merry Christmas 2007

Elmer's Christmas tree. A potted Norfolk Pine. Merry Christmas to all.

Up coming events:

2007-12-27, Thursday, Great Lake in Croatan National Forest. We meet at 9:30 at Pap's Variety Store in Kuhns on Rte 58. This about 8 miles north of Rte 24 and about 10 miles south of Maysville.

We caravan together to Great Lake from there. We plan to be off the water by 3:00

2008-01-01, New Year's Day, Pettiford Creek, upstream, east of the 58 Bridge. Turn west on Pettiford Road north of the bridge to the ramp on a dirt road at the bottom of the loop. We plan to be off the water by 3:00. And a Happy New Year too! Elmer

2007-12-19 Wallace Creek Camp Lejeune

2007-12-11 Northeast Creek from the New River to Northeast Creek Park in Jacksonville

We obtained two weeks passes at the Main Gate of Camp Lejeune and drove to Northeast Creek Park where we left Scott's car for our shuttle vehicle to get us back to Scales Creek in Camp Johnson where we launched our boats.

Stewards of the White Oak River Basin Current Events

This is where we put in, that is launched our canoes and kayaks for today's paddle. The water had a glassy surface at 9:00 AM. The first thing we did was to pick up all the litter and trash at this launching site which is a private site for the benefit of the homeowners of this subdivision on Pettiford Road in Pellitier. Please everybody who uses this area do not dispose of your left overs here. Please take them home with you.

After we paddled past the end of this dock we turned immediately left into a canal. We followed it to a dead end and backed out at it's narrow extremity at the end.

We had gone by three side channels on the way up. The first one appeared to be to best to take back to the river and on our way back we took this one and came back to Pettiford Creek.

We then turned upstream and past the other two channels and paddled up to a fourth one going north. It took us up to another east / west channel where we found several homes and ramps we took our right and ended up close to Rte 58 at the back side of the Marina.

There was an alligator at one ramp but he was an ornament. We reversed and went back to Pettiford Creek and turned west again to the bridge over Rte 58. More trash was found at all four shoulders of the bridge. Certainly one of these four shoulders should be a public access to Pettiford Creek. At present there is none. Access Committee Folks, please take note.