Tuesday, May 30, 2000
Ferne Clyffe State Park - May 30
We are currently at a lovely state park in the southern tip of IL. It has an abundance of ferns and rock formations, hence the name. It was named in 1899 and they kept the Old English spelling. There are lots of birds and hiking trails, so we will enjoy a couple of days here. Then we plan to head slowly back to CO, passing through MO, AR, OK and KS on the way.We spent the previous nine days near Paducah, KY. The first three nights we stayed at Canal campground, a beautiful Army Corps of Engrs campground on the northern shore of Lake Barkley. The TVA first dammed up the Tennessee river to form Kentucky Lake. Then, about 20 years later, they dammed up the Cumberland River forming Barkley Lake. The land between the two lakes is now a National Recreation Area managed by the NPS (taken over from TVA just this year) and is called Land Between the Lakes. Canal CG is just 3 miles north of the northern border of LBL. We had a beautiful site on the shore of a small inlet of the lake -- it was sort of like our own private lake.
We watched barges go through the locks of Kentucky Dam two separate days. The whole process is quite fascinating and you can see why the engineers love these projects! The first time we got to see how they completely fill up the lock with nine barges attached together. Then they have to lock the tugboat through afterward. The second day we saw a group of 15 barges get locked through in two groups. They used a little tow device attached to the side of the lock to tow the first nine out because the tug was still back with the last six.
Due to the park having reservations and being full for the Memorial Day weekend, we could only stay three nights. We then moved to a lovely spot on our friend Daisy Holt's land. This worked out well in many ways but especially since it made it much easier to visit and sightsee together. The only down side was limited electric power, so we could only run the most basic things -- no toaster, microwave or a/c. We visited three state parks, Kentucky Dam Village, Barkley Dam and Pennyrile, and enjoyed seeing each of them. We ate very good meals in their lodges. We also visited the Homeplace 1850, a restored farm from 1850, located in the southern part of Land Between the Lakes. It had farm animals, all the appropriate farm buildings, and interpretive staff in period clothing to show how things were done and answer questions. We even got to taste samples of baking done "the old-fashioned way".
Another day we visited Paducah and went to the National Quilt Museum. This is the museum of the American Quilting Society and has award-winning quilts from many of the annual quilt shows. It also had several exhibits that were quite interesting and a gift shop that had more quilting books than you could ever imagine. We wore ourselves out by looking around so much. We also walked on a short nature trail at a city park and looked at the flood walls along the Ohio River, built after the three devastating floods this century. The Tennessee river joins with the Ohio just before the center of Paducah. The flood walls are large concrete walls with gates that can be closed when floods threaten. Very interesting murals have been painted on them that depict scenes from the history of Paducah. In case you're wondering, Paducah was name for either an Indian Chief or tribe, depending on which story you believe.
Nothing too exciting in the birdwatching area. We have seen some new birds for us, but nothing unusual -- American Goldfinch, Eastern Phoebe, Carolina Chickadee, Blue-Grey Gnatcatcher and a cute pair of Eastern Bluebirds feeding their young.
# posted by Doug and Willie @ 8:51 PM 
