Most Amazing Moment in The Woods

[banjonut]

It's the combination of good friends, the outdoors, and stopping to just take it all in. I have many good memories laying on a warm rock on a cool day napping. And one particular breakfast of grits and spam that was just fantastic. And... well, there are so many.

[stravis]

I've had many and it's hard to choose just one. The scenery in the Grand Canyon, the Tetons, Yellowstone, Zion, Bryce, GSMNP, RMNP, Acadia, etc. have all been unforgettable, but I can recreate most of those by going back. One experience I doubt I'll ever be able to recreate happened while fishing in the Ten Thousand Islands which is where the Everglades flow into the Gulf of Mexico. It's a fantastic area to get away. Just a thirty minute boat ride from the often crowded dock and you're so deep that it would take rescuers weeks to find you. Truly an amazing place. There were three of us fishing that morning and we were quite a ways into the islands and a good distance from the ocean. The further back you go, the more often you run through very shallow water. To navigate the shallow water, you "pole" through it by pushing the boat slowly and silently through the water. A friend was poling us through a particularly shallow area around a group of mangroves when suddenly the water exploded. As we cleared the mangroves on our right, there were about 300 pink flamingos that we apparently startled into flight. They circled us overhead and lit right back where they were. For the next thirty minutes or so, we continued to fish while the flamingos watched from 30-60 yards away. I lived in southwest Florida for five years and my folks have lived there for 24 years. In that time, I'd seen one single wild flamingo. My folks had never seen one and to my knowledge, none of my friends there had seen any. To see a group that size and be able to spend some time with them was something I'll never forget.

[MAD777]

Many, many moons ago I was cross country skiing in Snowmass Wilderness, southwest of Aspen Colorado. I came around a "corner" and there was Maroon Bells looming over me. To this day, I don't think my jaw has seated properly.

[canoebie]

In my early days paddling the Manistee in northern lower Michigan, my son, who was about 8 at the time (celebrating his 30th this weekend) was with me and we were about to eat breakfast.

We were camped on a high sand dune about 100 feet above the water, a beautiful scene, all was quiet and the sun was rising on a crisp fall day. Within probably about 300 yards a pack of coyotes began to sing and yip. My son looked at me and said "What's that Dad?" , I replied, "coyotes." He literally jumped as high as he could and landed square in my lap with his arms wrapped tightly around my neck. I informed him that they were more afraid of us than we were of them. He was not convinced. We talked of the beauty of wild things and the food chain and so on and after a while, and whole lot of coyote noise later he smiled and said, "They really do sound kind of pretty Dad."

I love to canoe and camp with that kid to this day. Now I have a 1 year old grandson that I want to take to that campsite and introduce to the singing of coyotes. The cycle of life continues.

[Carver]

We were on a packout from a forest fire in Glacier when we decided that it would be better to set up camp and wait for daylight before we continued to bushwhack our way out. If we would have gone another chain further, we would have discovered the railroad grade in the wilderness. Everyone was sound asleep before the first train stormed by in what seemed to be the middle of our camp.

[Gooey]

This looks and sounds amazing... love the pics

Thanks for sharing!

[Deadphans]

Thanks for sharing all. These are great stories, keep it coming! I know its hard to pick that "one time", but hearing these stories, even if its "one of the many amazing hard to pick moments", is great to me. I really enjoy it, as I hope you all are as well.

Cranky Bear that warmed my heart right up, seeing the kids enjoying the outdoors. I hope my future kids will do the same one day. I particularly like the picture of your kid with the fake beard crochet. LOL!

Canobie - I had a very similar experience as your son. Only I was quite a bit older. I had just moved to Maine from New Jersey at the age of 21 (only 6 years ago) and I had never really encountered wildlife. Sure I went camping but it was mostly in the New Jersey area and I never encountered wildlife like I did in Maine. To make a long story short, I was in the middle of the woods at my friends homestead having a smoke outside, after only being in Maine for 1 month this was all still VERY new to me, homesteads? the real woods? the dark quiet stuff? Awesome! All of a sudden YIP YIP OUUUUUU. Scared the bejebus out of me. My Maine friends all laughed and said "Silly Jersey kid its only coyotes, nothing to be worried about". I laughed and took it all in. Couple years later had Coyotes in my camp at GSMNP yipping away and sat back and listened. It was awesome!

[Boothill]

the most amazing moment in the woods.....that's easy.....this past saturday, because it was the last time i have been out, every time out in the black hills is that way for me though

boot

[cjayflo]

My first thought was that my most amazing moment in the woods is every time I see whats on the other side of that hill or around that bend on the path.

[Doctari]

My all time favorite, & it's not "Spectacular" in anyway, but I was hiking along the AT just N of the Thomas knob shelter in the Grayson Highlands, & for those who know the AT, there are a lot, , , that's A LOT of seemingly pointless routing. So, I was again cussing those who lay out the AT, something along the lines of "Why did they take me off that small ridge for 50' just to make me climb back up to it on this stupid r OHMYGODLOOKATTHAT!"
Sorry no pictures, camera was dead, but as my head cleared the "stupid rock", the view framed by it was the best that trip, maybe ever, and as a bonus there was a young (I'm guessing 3 months) pony colt & Mom helping to frame the view. Granted, had I seen the view from the ridge instead of the stupid rock route, it wouldn't have been that great, but it was ABSOLUTELY PERFECTLY presented.

The cool thing about mom & son: Mom gave me a horses version of "Hey, howyoudoing" Didn't stop chewing or even act like she was going to get up (was laying down) Son was jumping around, ready to run from me "WHAT IS THAT THING MOM?" Mom gave him the "Just chill" look that all mom's can do, regardless of species. Yea, you know the one.


Suffice it to say I now rarely cuss those who do the trail routing,,,, rarely.
Cause you never know what that will lead to.