For the two Palmetto Trail sections in South Carolina that Carol and I were tackling on this outing, we’d planned 4 days of hiking, but not necessarily contiguous miles (big word). Each day we checked the weather, the trail maps, and ground conditions so we don’t go swimmin’ with gators.
After a night of steady rain, we woke up to a lighter drizzle in the morning. The forecast swore it would increase to a steady downpour and then…Aha! Clear skies by afternoon.
We’d spent 2+ hours looking at maps for alternative access to Section 2 of Lake Moultrie Passage. After a breakfast of possibly the best biscuits ever made, stuffed with eggs and cheese and…yeah, I’ll take the bacon, too…we set out in both cars, going down several roadways that looked okay on paper but were impassable.
Plan B: Eutaw Springs Section 2. We drove the route as far as we could from the intersection of Old Number Six Highway and Rocks Pond Road to Gardensgate (be patient, someone like us is reading these details because they need them). Nearly all pavement and dirt roads, lots of water-filled potholes, but better than wading in the swamps near Lake Moultrie.
When we finish those 8 miles or so, we’ll see if we have time for the remaining couple of miles to complete Section 2 in Eutawville.
We started at Gardensgate Road on an easy footpath following a fence line, graceful trees dripping with Spanish moss, bucolic views to open pastures.
We walked two more miles of straight dirt road, noticing that the water puddles we’d seen earlier had been quickly absorbed by the sandy soil. We met a local man walking his dog. He said he called this road “Gator Road” and saw an uncommonly big one just last week. Huh.
In the same stretch we paused at a heartfelt memorial to a young man who was an avid duck hunter. He died at 2018 at the age of 17, but the memorial looked very recent, lovingly maintained.
The remainder of the road walk featured swampy areas with cypress trees and knees, a juvenile brown snake, and an armadillo carcass.
We arrived at Rocks Pond Road with time to reposition our cars and knock off the rest of Section 2. The stretch was all road walking from “downtown” Eutawville to Gardensgate Road. There was a sidewalk on one side, along with aggressive dogs protecting their houses, so we had to cross to the opposite shoulder (no sidewalk).
This last bit on a busy road got us thinking about another stretch of road on Lake Moultrie Section 2 (tomorrow’s route). It’s 3 miles on Highway 6, including the diversion canal bridge, lots of traffic and not much shoulder. The Palmetto Trail is designated on roadways when dirt tread is not possible, BUT good judgment tells us not to walk every inch if it doesn’t feel safe.
All in all, a successful day! Back at camp, we discovered that our tents were now surrounded by water. No other tent campers, so we moved to dry ground wherever we could find it. A shower, a meal, and recharging power banks while we plotted tomorrow’s adventure.
