Goose Creek State Park

August 16, 2014

Goose Creek State Park lies on the banks of the Pamlico River about 30 miles east of Greenville. I was drawn to this park because a circuit hike of all the park’s trails would give me a solid afternoon of hiking 8-10 miles. Like most state parks in NC, the park was easy to find with Google Maps taking me right there and plenty of directional signs as I got closer. I parked at the main park office/ranger station just inside the park entrance. There is additional parking deeper inside the park for campers, swimmers, and people who want a different trail access point.

Since I do a lot of hiking alone, I make it a point to 1) let a friend or family member know where I’m going and when they can expect to hear from me when I’m done; and 2) “check in” at the ranger station if there is one. Many of the places I hike don’t have an official check in, but I feel like it’s a good habit to say “hi” so if something happens someone might remember seeing me. After getting seriously turned around on a hike earlier this year (do we have to call it “lost”?), it gives me a little peace of mind.

So after saying “hi” to the rangers and confirming this park doesn’t have a lot of un-blazed trails or logging roads to get turned around on, I headed off down the Palmetto Boardwalk. As the name implies, this trail is entirely an elevated boardwalk through marshland. I’ve loved cattails since I was a kid and there were plenty lining both sides of the trail. Wildlife finds included a pileated woodpecker and many turtles.

Palmetto Boardwalk

Cattails

The trail terminates and you can choose to head down the Ivey Gut Trail or the Tar Kiln Trail. I turned right towards the Ivey Gut Trail. The Ivey Gut Trail is where I started to see deer galore. I saw more deer than people this day! The muddier sections of all the trails in the park were completely pock marked with deer hoof prints. I didn’t count, but I’d estimate seeing at least 30 deer.

Can you see the deer?

The Ivey Gut Trail leads to views of Goose Creek, where I saw several kayakers enjoying the tranquil waters.

Goose Creek

Kayaker on Goose Creek

 The trail eventually crosses a park road before terminating on Goose Creek Trail. As I wanted to see and hike the entire park, I turned right for an out-and-back section of the trail. This section of the trail passes near several tent camping sites. The end of the trail has several benches that provide a nice overlook of Goose Creek as it widens out to join the Pamlico River. It was a peaceful place to eat lunch.

Peaceful spot for lunch overlooking Goose Creek

Erosion revealing this tree's root system

 Heading back on the Goose Creek Trail, I took the side path to the Flatty Creek Trail, a less-than-one-mile side trail with more views of the Pamlico River. This section of the park has signage indicating the park is a National Natural Landmark.

After exiting the Flatty Creek Trail, I turned right to continue back on the Goose Creek Trail. The next couple of miles were a little boring, until a saw a group of wild turkeys (which I just learned is called a “rafter” of turkeys). Oh yeah, and a lot more deer… Goose Creek Trail eventually terminates near an access point for swimming in the Pamlico River. I skipped this turn off point and headed down the Live Oak Trail, a very short trail that takes you past a small cemetery dating to the 1880’s. Not much is known about the cemetery, but it is thought to be the resting place of victims of an infectious disease outbreak.

The Live Oak Trail takes you to the short Huckleberry trail, which takes you to the short Mallard Creek Trail. This aptly named trail terminates with overviews of Mallard Creek.

Mallard Creek

Heading back on Mallard Creek Trail, I intersected with the last trail of the day, the Tar Kiln Trail. This trail has sections that are heavily canopied with Spanish moss, and takes you past several old tar kilns. I liked the historic aspects of the trail, which made me remember learning as a child about the importance of naval stores to North Carolina’s history and how the Tar Heel State got its nick name.

Spanish moss on the Tar Kiln Trail

I was feeling a little warm and ragged on the last section of the Tar Kiln Trail. My GPS showed I was at about 8.5 miles, and also getting close to my original turnoff from the Palmetto Boardwalk. I was happy to get back there and didn’t dally as much heading back to the ranger station, as the sudden exit from the woods into the sunny and humid marsh was a bit unpleasant. Arriving back at the ranger station, I eagerly drank a deliciously cold Dr. Pepper from the vending machine before getting in the car to head home.

Summary: I liked this park. Well-marked trails are always appreciated. I had read an online review that said the ticks here were ridiculous, but my tick check at the end of the day was clear. Final mileage for the day was 9.2 miles, which took me about 3.5 hours.

Hello there, old Blog

For the past few weeks I’ve been thinking about reactivating the blog. I do a lot of hiking and really enjoy finding personal experiences on the internet of what to expect on a hike. How hard was the trail to find? What was the terrain like? How bad were the bugs? Did you see anything cool? So I’ve been thinking about blogging my hikes. There’s not much to “do” where I’m living in Eastern NC (other than going to the beach, which I do several times each week), so most weekends I get in the car and drive anywhere from 30 minutes to several hours to find a hiking spot. My planned blog entries will focus on these day hikes. I’ve done several hikes since I first got the idea to blog about them, so those entries will be coming soon. I haven’t decided yet if I want to retroactively blog hikes I’ve done in the distant past. I may do that, but I’m leaning towards revisiting those sites and blogging about them afterwards. It will be fun to visit old places with a new purpose in mind!

Blergh

"Dude.... you need to update your blog!" -- anonymous

I know, I know. It's just that I've been trapped under a mountain of work and/or apathy for the last few months. Feel free to make your own assessment of the work:apathy ratio.

Trapped

Blogging Finals: Day 7

Last exam is complete. Time to party.

(censored photo)

Blogging Finals: Day 6

This morning’s cumulative Small Animal Medicine exam went pretty well. I thought most of the teachers did a good job of hitting the high points and avoiding the pure-memorization little factoids. It’s a huge weight to have off my shoulders; this exam has been a source of constant, low level stress for weeks! Tomorrow’s exam is in Lab Animal and Special Species Medicine; it covers avian medicine and the care of orphaned wildlife. I feel pretty good about this exam. Volunteering at the Carolina Raptor Center for several years, plus having previously taken an avian medicine selective, has prepared me quite well. Most of the material is a review for me. As such, it’s been a very relaxing day. It’s been difficult to not go ahead and get started on the post-exams celebrations! But I can wait and I will wait: tomorrow is going to be awesome!

I am really enjoying this warm weather! The cats are, too. They spent most of the day hanging out on the porch. There are definitely some things we miss about Texas – warm winters are a big one! We’ll keep enjoying the mild days for as long as they last here. I know the cold weather snuggling will be here soon enough…

How I'll know when it's time to turn the heat on.

Blogging Finals: Days 3-5

My equine medicine exam was on Saturday morning. My current inability to recall anything for more than 1 minute after learning it hurt me a bit, but I was so happy to be done with horses that I didn’t really care. I left the exam to find a voice mail message from my sister-in-law, inviting me over for a pre-Thanksgiving dinner. Since they live an hour and half away and I was in the middle of finals, my acceptance was kind of a surprise to all of us.

Hanging out with this kid instead of studying? Heck yeah!

I had a productive studying afternoon so I headed out to the Stell mini-farm feeling pretty guilt-free. Dinner was delicious and it was great to see everyone. I ate a lot and drank a lot, played with my niece, looked at stars with my brother’s telescope, chased chickens around the backyard, and helped my sister-in-law treat a cut on her horse’s leg. Who would have thought that on the same day I said goodbye to equine medicine, I would be doing a little equine medicine?!

I stayed up late and slept late, and I was reluctant to leave on Sunday morning. But I had to get back home and back to studying! Sadly, I did more napping and watching football than I did studying, so I went to bed early so I could get up early on Monday morning to finish studying for the Tox exam.

Monday morning Toxicology exam: The exam was fine, although I struggled a little to recall some facts. It’s amazing how quickly memorization-heavy material vacates your brain in times like these. (ETA: Our professor already graded our exams! What a shining example of the way things should be done, especially in a semester where most of our exams haven’t come back to us for 2-3 weeks!)

Since the Monday afternoon exam was open book, I spent the time in between exams studying for tomorrow’s Small Animal Medicine exam. Except I fell asleep about 30 minutes into it… I suffer from Studying-Induced Narcolepsy Syndrome (SINS).

Monday afternoon Exotic & Emerging Diseases exam: took 1.5 hours, which is 50-100% more time than I’ve spent on all the other exams in much higher credit hour classes. And it didn’t take long because it was open book: all the answers were easy to find. Really, really should have been a take-home exam. Instead, it pretty much ruined my whole afternoon, the day before my biggest exam.

I’m not very good at evening studying. My brain just works better in the morning. I don’t feel like mastering the details for tomorrow’s exam. I’m not sure I could, even if I wanted to – that whole “brain is full” feeling is really kicking in right about now. Since the exam is cumulative and is on material I actually really care about, I already know enough to do pretty well. If I could just get those last few items stashed somewhere safe in my brain…. damn broken Memorizer! It looks like it’s turning into another Netflix/early bedtime/get up early to cram kind of thing…

Blogging Finals: Day 2

Today’s exam was in Theriogenology (basically, that’s reproductive medicine for all you non-vet/animal science folks). This has been my least favorite class this semester – probably my least favorite class in all of vet school. Of course that’s easy to say with some of the stinkers of the past a distant memory… The exam went fine. I’m happy it is over. I’m thrilled to pack those notes away forever! Except for studying for those sneaky Therio questions on boards next year…

I do not care how to get you pregnant.

The results of all those theriogenologists' hard work are pretty cute, though.

It’s been an exceptionally unproductive studying day so far. And I’m okay with that.

Blogging Finals: Day 1

Written portion of the comprehensive TAU exam began at 8am with 60 multiple choice questions. Teacher jokingly said it could be done in 6 minutes. Challenge accepted. 8:05 = exam complete. Reading fast is my Super Power! Instructions for the practical portion were given at 8:45. Fire alarm goes off, so we move outside; we were going there anyway... It is 48 degrees and raining. (Yesterday, it was 79 degrees.) Nice teachers refuse to let us fail by coaxing and hinting us through stations with tests on dairy cattle, beef cattle, small ruminants, pigs, and horses. No poultry, because this season’s turkeys are already dead (yay, Thanksgiving!) and next semester’s chickens haven’t arrived yet. I stay dry in my raincoat but my toes are frozen by the end. Something about rubber boots just sucks the warmth right out. I had to go through 3 rope halters to find one I could work to halter and tie up a cow, but I passed! Back home to put on fleece, sweatpants, and slippers: study, study, study – right after I watch some Netflix and take a nap…

Your giant head cannot defeat me and my rope.

Final Exams, for the Next-to-Last Time

It’s that time of the semester: final exams start tomorrow. I was stressed about it a couple of weeks ago, but started studying early and now I feel pretty on top of things. The only class that’s giving me any trouble is Companion Animal Medicine, because the exam is cumulative. I know the material pretty well, so when I try to study I get bored and quit.

Finals Schedule

• Thursday: Farm animal knowledge and production. Comprehensive final covering our first 3 years with pigs, poultry, goats & sheep, horses, dairy cattle & beef cattle. It includes a practical. It’s pass/fail, so I’m going on faith that I’ve retained enough information about how to body condition score a beef cow and harness a horse that I can pass.

• Friday: Theriogenology. My least favorite class ever. It’s almost over.

• Saturday: Equine Medicine. Bye, bye, horseys.

• Monday: Toxicology (a.m.) and Exotic & Emerging Diseases (p.m.)

• Tuesday: Companion Animal Medicine. Stuff relevant to my career – yay!

• Wednesday: Lab Animal and Special Species Medicine

Other Stuff…

Over the last few weeks, we’ve been scheduling our 4^th year clinical rotations. I’m really pleased with how my schedule has turned out. It’s a nice mix of easy (okay, not necessarily easy, per se, but at least not too hard) and hard, with my vacation blocks spread out at good times. I’m really excited about the two extramural externships I have planned. One will be at a high volume, high quality spay & neuter facility in the mountains. The other will be at a local feline-only practice. I can’t believe clinics are less than 6 months away!

Fun Stuff…

For Halloween, a group of friends and I dressed up as the Zanesville, Ohio wild animal escape. I went as a gunshot tiger. We also had a monkey with herpes B and a bear. The shining star was our giraffe. True, there was no giraffe in the Ohio escape, but the costume idea was too awesome to pass up. This was the most effort I’ve ever put into a costume. Painting my face took an hour! It was worth it, though. (And of course, my effort paled in comparison to the hours and hours it took to make the giraffe.)

The giraffe was very tall!

Missing: one monkey with Herpes B.

Santa gets a kiss from giraffe: my favorite Halloween 2011 picture.

I went to my first NCSU tailgate and football game. It was fun. It would have probably been more fun if I could get into the NCSU cheers and traditions. NCSU won (beat rival UNC) so the fans were happy. I think I prefer watching SEC games from the comfort of my couch.

NCSU vs. UNC tailgate

Leaving China

May 20-21, 2011

Our last day of class was a half-day. After our last couple hours of instruction, we each received a course-completion certificate.

Add caption

For lunch, a group of us went to a restaurant called Big Pizza. It was kind of like a Chinese version of Cici’s, except with beer: all you could eat buffet plus all you could drink beer from their flat, dirty keg for about $7. Neither the food nor the beer were any good, but we had a blast and stayed for hours.

Big Pizza beer

The gang at Big Pizza.

Megan had a pirate patch as part of her treatment for Beijing pollution-induced corneal ulcer.

That night, the entire group of Americans headed downtown to see an acrobat show. A mixture of poor planning, tardiness, and bad traffic made us late. Since I wasn’t there for the beginning of the show and any introductions or instructions, I wasn’t sure what the rules for photography were, so I didn’t take any pictures or videos. The show was impressive and fun. My favorite part was when 13 women all climbed onto one bike and rode it around the stage.

After the show, Megan, Ashley, and I traveled back to our favorite streets near our old hostel by the Drum Tower. We hung out in some of our favorite bars and I did some last minute souvenir shopping. It was a great last night in China!

Ashley is angry that I'm leaving China.

I was very sad the next morning as I packed up my stuff to leave. Megan and Ashley were staying in China for a while longer, but I had to go home to start my summer job. I thought by the end of 3+ weeks I would be ready to go home, but I truly was not. I had such a great time and was disappointed I’d be missing out on the next leg of travel with my friends.

I had one last bit of Chinese excitement to deal with for my departure. After I climbed in my taxi, the driver asked which terminal I was flying out of. I didn’t know, and didn’t know I needed to know, since I’m used to American airports where the airlines/terminals are listed on big signs as you approach the airport. I ran back inside the hotel to ask the front desk which terminal carried Air China, and they assuredly told me Terminal Two.

After I was dropped off at Terminal Two, I made my way through the first security line with my big bags. Once I was inside, I looked and looked for the Air China ticket desk but couldn’t find it. I finally asked someone, and she told me Air China was at Terminal Three! She told me to go back out through security and take the bus to the correct terminal. I lugged my big bags (now extra heavy with both my souvenirs and stuff Megan and Ashley were sending back) outside and looked for the inter-terminal bus. And looked and looked, and was waved away from several bus drivers I tried to ask for more information. I thought I had left for the airport with plenty of time, but as the minutes ticked away I was getting more and more nervous. Perhaps my time in China was going to be extended….

Finally, a kindly porter came over to help me. We had some trouble understanding each other at first. He kept trying to get me to follow him, but I didn’t know where he was trying to take me. I finally figured it out, and he led me to the right area for the right bus. It was far away – back inside and downstairs and a long walk. I was so grateful! He got the biggest tip I’d given anyone yet in China.

I’m happy to say my Beijing-New York flight was a million times better than my New York-Beijing flight! No delays, no screaming baby, no middle seat, no puking neighbors. Flying should always be like this! I was able to read and sleep in peace, and just like that, I was home.

Chuandixia

May 17, 2011

We had spent some time thinking about what we wanted to do for our weekend between classes. We definitely wanted to get away from Beijing for a bit, so had made a short list of day or overnight trips that sounded fun. We ultimately settled on visiting Chuandixia, an old, charming village about 90 km northwest of Beijing in the mountains. Since the village is tiny, we decided we could see it all in one day rather than doing an overnight, although it was very tempting to stay the night since all lodging there is via home stays in the courtyard homes. In addition to the courtyard homes and beautiful mountain views, Chuandixia is touted for its well-preserved Maoist propaganda.

We learned the best way to get there was to hire a taxi for the day from one of the big transit stations in Beijing. After some back and forth haggling with a couple of guys at the station, we settled on a nice older man who agreed to take us for 300Y roundtrip. He had a friend along to ride in the front seat, so the three of us piled into the back of his little white minibus/van and headed out.



The drive was exciting and terrifying: our driver made record time, especially when we came to the curvy mountain roads. Once we decided to just ignore the fact that we might DIE, it was kind of like a roller coaster ride.

We made one stop at a scenic overlook of a large dam on the way.

As we approached the village, our driver pulled over and motioned for us to get out of the car. We complied, not really knowing where we were or why we were getting out, but whatever… and then our driver drove off without us! He stopped not too far down the road, and we figured out we were supposed to walk this little stretch for some reason. It was very confusing, until we reached the end of our little walk and the driver explained through hand motions and our limited understanding of Mandarin that the place we had just walked through had been carved out by water: it was just something cool and pretty he wanted us to experience.

What is going on?

So we got back in the van and shortly arrived in the village. As it turned out, our driver had family in Chuandixia, so he introduced us to them and then we were off to explore. We hiked a little trail that gave us a skyline view of the village, and then spent the rest of the afternoon exploring the courtyards. There was a group of art students visiting the village that day – it was neat to watch them draw, and they were very entertained by our presence. We were a little disappointed in the “well-preserved” Maoist propaganda. There were a few Chinese characters painted on the sides of building, but nothing very flashy or exciting. Several of the homes were open for business – meaning we could sit down and the homeowner would serve us beer and food. We ordered some wonderful food by just saying a combination of things like “noodles”, “vegetables”, and “whatever you recommend.” It was a glorious, relaxing afternoon and we were reluctant to leave.

The village of Chuandixia

Chuandixia and mountains

Chinese art student at work

Courtyard lunch

Please don't put anything from this jar in our food.

Cheap Seats (minus Rob) in China!

When we got back to Beijing that night, we found a place to have the famous Peking Duck for dinner. Perfect Peking Duck involves infusing the skin with just the right mix of marinade and then frying it. It’s world famous, and apparently very difficult to find an excellent version anywhere other than Beijing. I tried it and liked it well enough even though I’m not big on skin or fried stuff in general. Still, it was worth the experience. The evening was a kind of sad, knowing we had to go back to school in the morning and that my time in China was rapidly approaching its end.

Peking Duck

Summer Palace

May 16, 2011

Early on in the acupuncture course, we voted to move our “weekend” to Monday and Tuesday. The idea was to take advantage of our flexible schedule and plan touristy things on the week days when stuff would be less crowded. During my brief time in China, I hadn’t noticed a big difference in crowds on week days vs. weekends, but whatever. So we made it through 7 days of school, and finally our “weekend” arrived on Monday!

I enjoyed a lazy start to the day: slept late, tried to organize the messy explosion from my suitcase, sent a few emails, drank a few beers… Finally, in the early afternoon, we took off for the Summer Palace. It was a beautiful afternoon and we enjoyed strolling around the lake, pausing here and there to just relax and take in the sights. I could definitely see the appeal of the area as a summer resort for Chinese royalty.

Chinese noodles

Relaxing at the Summer Palace

More relaxing at the Summer Palace

The Long Corridor

It was a windy day at the Summer Palace

Rickshaw!

After leaving the park, we hailed a rickshaw to take us to the nearest subway station. The three of us piled in the back was definitely a fun ride! We made a mistake in not agreeing on a fare beforehand, and our driver tried to massively overcharge us when we got off. Even granting him some extra for hauling all three of us, he was asking too much. We were helped in our exchange by a subway security guard, who was successful in running off the tourist-hassling rickshaw driver after we had paid him a much more than fair fare.

We decided to head towards the 798 Art District to see China’s version of SoHo.  When we got off the subway, we estimated we still had about 3km to travel to get to the district. We first tried to hire a taxi, but were turned off by the prices and decided to walk. This turned out to not be a great idea, as the street we were on became a major highway. We trudged along the shoulder, tired and hungry, and some of us who shall remain nameless stopped to pee in the bushes. We’d finally had enough of this form of travel when we came to a bus station. We boarded a bus that seemed to be heading in the right direction and got off at what seemed to be a stop relatively close to the art district. And then we trudged some more… it’s possible our estimation of distances had been off… When we finally arrived in the right area it was around 9pm and all the art galleries were closed as were many of the cafes – it was disappointing, especially after the several hours time we had spent working to get there. Proving that even in Beijing, it’s a small world after all, we ran into some of our friends who were finishing up dinner. So we ate and had a few drinks and decided 798 must surely be cooler in the daytime.

Third Year Blues

Everyone says second year of vet school is the most difficult. Course-wise, that may be true; but I’m here to say that third year is no picnic, either. I’m pretty sure there’s some research out there that says two years into anything (relationships, employment, etc.) is when people start to really get sick of things, and I am sick of vet school. So I plan to finish the last couple of China blog entries, right after I catch up on equine lameness lectures. I think equine lameness is truly my least favorite subject so far in school. The material is the perfect combination of confusing/complicated and totally irrelevant to my future career. It’s hard to give a damn.

There are still good parts about school:

{Perfectly benign photo of cute kitten removed to comply with social media policy}

Neutering shelter kittens so they can be adopted!

Drinking with friends!

Things for my reader to look forward to in the coming weeks: the Summer Palace, Chuandixia, and Leaving China!