History of Dalcon/Amplion

Report on January 2020 NBB adventure Canoe trip to Okefenokee swamp.

Since we were without our NBB adventure group expert trip secretary Rube, on this trip, I’ll try to substitute.

It was a small NBB group this time with Dan, Sam, and I making our respective trips to Southeast Georgia. We were all feeling airplane deprived since Dan and I are both temporarily grounded and so, Dan drove 11hr round trip from Canton, GA, I did about 10 hr of commercial air time, and Sam did about 10 hr of drive time to and from Carrabelle with stops at JAX to shuttle me. It would have been a perfect mission for our airplanes.

However, otherwise the trip was a very successful adventure, primarily thanks to Sam’s excellent research and planning, and some great luck with the weather.

We met in Folkston, GA on Sunday, and Sam and I had some extra time to verify canoe bookings and plans and do a drive and walk through the Chesser homestead which originally was settled in the swamp in 1858. The same family owned and operated the farm until the National Refuge was formed and purchased it in 1927.

Okefenokee means “Land of the trembling earth.” The swamp was formed by a large depression in the earth and much of what you see that looks like land is actually floating peat and when the early americans walked on it it would tremble under their feet. There are early inhabitant mounds dating back 4000 years, the Spanish were there in the 1600s, so the vegetation and wildlife there have supported man for a very long time. It is one of the most intact and well preserved freshwater ecosystems in the world.

Sam had made bookings for us at the Folkston Inn for Sunday night. It is an historical home now b&b run by Ted and Alease, who were perfect hosts.

Monday morning early we were at the main Canal Run entrance, which is the Eastern end of the canal that bisects the swamp running east to west until it becomes the headwaters of the Suwanee River. The swamp is only about 50 ft above sea level at its high point. It is 38 mi north to south by 25 miles east to west so we only explored a very small part of it in our three days. For those  that were with us on the Cumberland Island trip, the St Mary's River that has its mouth there also rises from the swamp.

Sam took first turn at solo canoe and Dan was helmsman on our canoe as we loaded up our two canoes and shoved off into the wilderness with no real idea of what to expect. 

At the official entry to the wilderness area we were greeted by the welcoming committee, as seen here. Amazingly on our exit two days later, they were both within yards of where we saw them as we entered.

The scenery kept changing as we went further and further into the swamp. We elected to proceed directly north of the canal to our first night platform at Cedar Hammock, set up camp and then explore more in the afternoon. The facilities were compact but comfortable at this platform which sat out in the middle of Mizell Prairie . Prairie  is the term they use for parts of the swamp which are mostly open grassy marshes with few trees. 

In the afternoon we paddled about six more miles exploring the Chesser Prairie on the south side of the canal where we saw an amazing number of alligators.  At one point we appeared to be in a nest of about ten small ones while looking around nervously for mamma and papa. Over the three days we probably saw 15-20 gators.

As we made the loop we ended up mostly dead reckoning back to the canal, but were grateful for gps help since the prairie had few landmarks  and all looked pretty much alike.

The downside of the swamp trip was no campfires—a bummer, but we had a great evening under the stars and  moon enjoying our freeze dried dinner, cigars, and drinks. It was pretty neat at one point to look beside our floating platform and see a little alligator quietly drifting by.

It was a cold night getting down to about 38, but as soon as the sun came up we were comfortable. Breaking camp and packing up the canoes we headed out again with Dan solo as we continued to head deeper into the swamp. At places the canal became more narrow and overhanging, and with some regularity we would be surprised when an alligator jumped into the river, or just sat lazily in the sun watching as we passed by. We heard more birds, especially owls, than we saw on the trip but did enjoy spotting, buzzards, hawks, great egrets, white ibis, herons, as well as lots of woodpeckers. There are 234, species of birds, 50 mammals, and 64 reptiles that can be found in the swamp.

The water of the swamp is a very dark brown, from tannin's in the vegetation which gives it a mirror-like appearance with views in calm water that really made it challenging to tell where the water stopped and the land began.

The most impressive part of the experience to me was the quiet. We were so far from any road we never heard sounds of civilization so just dipping the paddle into the water was often the only sound we heard. We saw a grand total of two other canoes over our three days. We basically felt like we had the whole place to ourselves. They do allow motorboats on the main canal, but we only saw a few of those boats as well.

The second night platform was at Coffee Bay right on the canal. It was on a piece of land so had a bit more room to spread out. The only clouds we saw on the whole trip were a few that afternoon, but they were gone by evening. We saw/heard a few mosquitos each night but they didn’t seem to be biting so no bug problems on the trip. We kept an eye out for snakes, particularly the Indigo which can be over 8 ft, longest in North America, but never spotted any snakes. We did see lots of turtles, mostly about dinner plate sized, but they were pretty skittish and jumped into the water as we approached.

After another cold night and breakfast we turned the canoes back east and paddled about six miles back out. I’d say we all felt the muscles aching from paddling since it was all basically flat water, with only small currents and a little  wind to contend with.

We were ready for the celebration hamburger as we ended the trip.

We were sorry to miss our other NBBr’s and the special camaraderie that the group seems to have. 

Respectfully submitted,

David,

Substitute secretary