Cedars of Lebanon State Park

Tuesday, August 22   Cedars of Lebanon State Park, Lebanon TN

Today’s main focus was checking out the trails at Cedars of Lebanon Park.  As we learned in the Nature Center, there are no actual cedars in the park.  At one time, cedar trees were abundant in the county, but logging took care of most of them.  There are still a few scattered around the county, but the trees here that we refer to as “red cedar” are actually a species of juniper.

We lathered up with sunscreen and bug spray, and set out to find the Limestone Sinks and the Hidden Springs trails.  According to the signs, the Limestone Sinks trail was developed as an Eagle Scout project.  It is supposed to be a self- guided trail.  There are numbered signposts all along the trail and I assume that there is or was at some point a printed guide to accompany them. 

We weren’t sure what was meant by the “sinks” but there were quite a few rock outcroppings and places where water had undercut them.  The trail was only about a mile long, but it was a nice walk.

We did see a tree with a large burl on it.  A burl is a place where the tree has been damaged and repaired itself, almost like scar tissue.  This is where real burl wood comes from and why the grain in such wood is gnarled and twisted.  This one was huge.  Most of the burls we’ve seen before are only a foot or so across.  This one was all of four feet.

Next we walked the Hidden Springs trail.  It was quite a bit longer and covered wooded areas, rocky stream beds, and fields.  We never did find any springs, but we were pretty sure that some of the sites probably became stream beds in the spring.

Someone had built a small cairn in the field.  These are usually used to mark trails in places where there are no trees to blaze or in the absence of signposts.  But here we think it was just a whimsical creation.  In fact, at another spot farther along, we found several in a small group.

Black-eyed Susans covered a small glade, and grew alongside the trail.

And yes I did play with the last of those two photos, enhancing the shadows and contrast. But I like the way it came out, sort of mysterious and otherworldly.

We did see quite a bit of wildlife along the five mile trail.  A doe and yearling danced just out of camera range, and we saw a box turtle and king snake along the side of the trail.  Also some cardinals and blue jays.

Near the end of the trail we came across this odd formation.  It was either a deep sinkhole or perhaps a long forgotten well.  It looked to be about 15-20 feet deep and 2 ½ to 3 feet across.  There was a fence built around it to keep nosy hikers from falling in.

After 7 miles of hiking, we headed back to camp for a rest and lunch, then set back out to find the last couple of trails up near the park entrance.

We started out on the Cedar Run Trail but quickly decided that it would not be much fun walking a 2 mile road through an open field.  Abandoning that project, we picked the trail to the Jackson Cave.  It didn’t look like much from the outside

The temperature dropped at least 10 degrees near the 4 foot tall entrance, so it had to go back some distance.  We couldn’t see more than about 6 feet inside, but the map posted at the trailhead showed that the cave system is quite extensive and ranges in height from 12 feet down to 2 feet in spots.  It is classified as a recreational cave but you need permission from the park office to enter it.  The next picture shows the cave system.  Some brave soul(s) crawled through those 2 ft spaces to create this map.

After a walk through the very nice Nature Center, we strolled through the butterfly garden, where we saw the bronze pelican and the plaque bearing a witty limerick about the bird by Dixon Merritt.

A wonderful bird is the pelican

His bill will hold more than his belican

He can take in his beak

Food enough for a week

But I’m damned if I see how the helican

With that we moved to the Dixon Merritt trail where we took no pictures because by this time all the trails began to look alike, although we did see a hawk.

By the time we returned to camp we had covered another 3 miles, making a total of 10 for the day, not counting the walks we took with Bailey.

As always, Lyle has met someone that he knows.  We met some folks from the New Orleans area yesterday and found that they have taken the same trip out west that we did a few years ago, visiting many of the same places.  And as we are, they are headed up to Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, then on up to Maine and Nova Scotia.  Today we met some of their friends who are camping next to them.  This fellow has a brother that Lyle has hunted with many times.

                                                                                   

The weather was hot but nice most of the day but it is raining now and a cold front is coming through.  It should pass during the night and tomorrow’s weather is predicted to be cooler and dry.  Hope so, because we move tomorrow and we hate to pack up in the rain.