Hey Everyone!  I hope everyone is safe and healthy.  Last week I took a little day trip to Merchants Millpond State Park in North Carolina.  This is a trip that I had planned a couple of weeks ago, but the coronavirus put a stop to the trip as the parks closed in North Carolina.  The parks opened to trails only and no camping yet last week and should re-open to campers in a week or so.  This park is located in the northeastern part of North Carolina, not too far from the Virginia border.  The park offers hiking trails, biking trails, camping, kayaking, and canoeing.  Some of the campsites you can kayak to. The Millpond offers fishing and kayaking and is really beautiful with cypress trees in abundance.

Our trip started early in the morning with an over-two-hour drive to get there. The trip I had planned earlier was an overnight trip because of the distance.  As a side note, when the parks were closed a representative of the parks called me promptly to give me a refund of my money for the camping!  I find that the staff at most of the state parks are very helpful and courteous.  My wife and my travel companion Forrest were traveling with me.  They both needed a break away from being cooped up in the house.  After arriving, we went to the Millpond and started with the photography and hiking.  The pond is really beautiful and calming.  We saw some kayakers put their boats in the water and start gliding through the trees on the way to finding some fish.  There were not a lot of people at the park, and it could be because of the virus or because it was Sunday morning.  But either way it was nice not to have people everywhere.  We took a two-mile hike on one of the trails there and went to the bridge over the pond to take some photos. We also planned on going to visit Dismal Swamp State Park which was only a 30-minute drive away.  When I'm on these trips, the way I like to do my photography is by myself.  I can take my time looking at stuff and don't feel that I'm being rushed to do something.  Forrest is getting better at stopping when I stop and sitting by patiently while I'm shooting. My wife waits patiently too.  But she always wants a photo of her wherever we go, so I have to stop what I'm doing to take a photo of her.  But it's still nice to have her along.  Here is a link to a short video that I made of this trip. Merchants Millpond Video So after the photography we took a short drive to Dismal Swamp State Park.  This park is very close to the Virginia border on US 17.  It is mainly a kayaking and canoeing park as well, but they do have some hiking trails that are really dirt roads and are also for bike riding.  We really didn't stay here long because we wanted to visit Edenton, North Carolina, a small little town that I grew up in that we visit a few times a year.  When we arrived, the streets that are usually full of people downtown were mainly empty, I guess because of the virus, which gave its a eerie feeling.  We went to a local park to have lunch and look over Edenton Bay.  The view was great, and we had a good lunch.  After lunch, we rode around town as we always do to check out the old house that I grew up in and check out other things that have changed.  We then started on our way home.  It was overall a great trip, and we knocked two more state parks off of my list.  Maybe next weekend we'll go to another.  Until then, stay safe and healthy and get outside and shoot!