Giant T@B Cache in Southern IL

Here it is the end of August, and I'm still trying to finish my blog posts of my springtime travels....eee gads!  Well, I've been wildly busy this summer working as a volunteer interpretive ranger at Bryce Canyon NP, and the connectivity here (and spare time) have been pretty minimal.  So, I'll try to mash together multiple posts into one today, and move the backlog along a bit!

My final week in southern Illinois this past April was spent doing the 2 big things I'd come to the area to do: attend the Midwest T@B Rally at Giant City State Park, and finally (FINALLY) paddle and explore the Cache river basin-- the northernmost cypress tupelo swamp in North America.

Surprising Southern Illinois

You'd think after being a resident of Illinois for 40-some years, I would have discovered southern Illinois far sooner.  But it always seemed to be "pass-thru" territory as I criss-crossed the region to get to somewhere else.

That was finally remedied this past April when southern Illinois became my home for 2 weeks.  My dear old T@B camping friends were holding a rally near Carbondale, so that became the destination to my 2,000-mile journey back to the Midwest.

Arriving to Carbondale about a week before the rally, I decided to check out Crab Orchard National Wildlife Refuge-- one of the very few NWRs that offers public RV camping with hookups inside its borders.

I arrived just ahead of the weekend warriors and snagged this gorgeous lakefront site for a week.  Just love "first come, first served" campgrounds!