Not that I long for the ‘good old days’ but there are just some things that we should all hang on to, such as traveling for little short trips with the family. When I was growing up Daddy was always spraying the cotton fields from early spring till fall so it was up to Mom to take me and my sister for little mini vacations during the summer months.
With the Labor Day long weekend looming, my husband and I decided to take our daughters for a short jaunt over into Alabama to a few choice places. Our oldest daughter plans on majoring in History so she requested places that have historical significance.
Getting into the big white people mover is like crawling into a time warp because of the music I like to listen to. An eclectic mix of tunes from the 50’s to the 80’s are pretty much what any traveling hostage has to listen to when traveling with me. We loaded the van with our bags and a cooler of bottled water plus an extra cooler for food as we wanted to picnic as much as we could. A quick trip to the grocery for fresh fruit and veggies and all the sandwich fixins’ and ice was all we needed to get started on our weekend adventure.
Our first stop was The Dismals located near Hamilton and Phil Campbell. The Dismals is a privately owned geological landmark where you step back in time when the earth was clean and water ran clear. The area is not commercially developed or cheesy. It’s a 1.5 mile nature trail down in a sandstone canyon and despite the "dismal" sounding name, this canyon offers a quiet and unspoiled oasis as Alabama’s last secret hiding place. It's a place of seclusion far off the beaten path with steep moss-covered rock walls, waterfalls, an icy stream, and flora and fauna indigenous to it alone. It's a place shrouded in mystery and in history. There are no flies or mosquitoes or poison ivy. There are trees growing deep in that canyon that are over 350 years old.
We hiked the Dismals for nearly 3 hours and then left to go and see the Natural Bridge. It’s a 148 foot span of sandstone and iron ore that rises 60 ft. off the floor of the forest below. It is truly a wonder of God’s creation. The winding hiking paths took us up and down some pretty rugged terrain and we all decided that we needed to be part mountain goat. Ferns were growing out of crevices in the huge boulders and on the sheer canyon walls. It started raining and we just kept hiking. The sound of the rain coming through the leaves was soothing. We really didn’t mind getting wet. The Natural Bridge is privately owned and the owners have left this area as unspoiled and untouched as possible. Its truly a nature conservatory.
Before heading back to the Dismals for the night hike to see the Dismalites we stopped for dinner at the A&W. Now that was a real step back into time. The little diner was so 1950’s and 60’s. We washed our burgers and fries down with real draught root beer floats served up in frosty glass mugs that A & W is so famous for. We returned to Dismals and sat and waited for darkness so we could go back down into the canyon to see the real stars of the Dismals. Dismalites are the glowing worms that infest the canyon walls. These have been known to swarm forth and skeletonize unsuspecting hikers in seconds. Just joking, of course. The worms only eat the brains of their victims.
No, really, there are glowing worms in the Dismals, though they're actually harmless (as far as we know). The worms are colloquially known as the "Dismalites," and they only exist in a couple of other pockets on the planet, and nowhere else in North America. "Dismalite" is a much better moniker than the critter's actual name, which is "fungus gnat" (or Arachnocampa luminosa). The tiny worms are the larval stage of the gnat, and they glow in order to attract other mites and flies to capture and eat.
Darkness fell out there in the Alabama woods and our tour guide David appeared. He was this tall burly stereotypical biker type of guy with lots of tattoos on his arms and a skull and crossbones do-rag on his head along with the black jeans and muscle t-shirt. He took the first group down the path to the caves where the little worms were. We were in the second group. It was hard enough in the day light negotiating the rough twisting and turn paths, now I was doing it with a flash light! We made our way to the caves and turned off the flash lights and the mossy walls started glowing. There were little points of bluish light here and there like little stars in the black night sky. I could not help but think about the Native Americans that used to live within those stone caves and what they must have thought the first time they saw those little points of light.
We made it back to our motel room in Hamilton after 10pm and we were all very tired. My legs were aching from all the climbing and hiking. As a family we had a great first day of a mini-vacation. We learned a lot of interesting historical facts, heard a lot of folk lore that was based on fact and most of all we learned that Nature can live without man but man cannot live without nature.
You can contact me at hallowed_grounds2633@yahoo.com.
With the Labor Day long weekend looming, my husband and I decided to take our daughters for a short jaunt over into Alabama to a few choice places. Our oldest daughter plans on majoring in History so she requested places that have historical significance.
Getting into the big white people mover is like crawling into a time warp because of the music I like to listen to. An eclectic mix of tunes from the 50’s to the 80’s are pretty much what any traveling hostage has to listen to when traveling with me. We loaded the van with our bags and a cooler of bottled water plus an extra cooler for food as we wanted to picnic as much as we could. A quick trip to the grocery for fresh fruit and veggies and all the sandwich fixins’ and ice was all we needed to get started on our weekend adventure.
Our first stop was The Dismals located near Hamilton and Phil Campbell. The Dismals is a privately owned geological landmark where you step back in time when the earth was clean and water ran clear. The area is not commercially developed or cheesy. It’s a 1.5 mile nature trail down in a sandstone canyon and despite the "dismal" sounding name, this canyon offers a quiet and unspoiled oasis as Alabama’s last secret hiding place. It's a place of seclusion far off the beaten path with steep moss-covered rock walls, waterfalls, an icy stream, and flora and fauna indigenous to it alone. It's a place shrouded in mystery and in history. There are no flies or mosquitoes or poison ivy. There are trees growing deep in that canyon that are over 350 years old.
We hiked the Dismals for nearly 3 hours and then left to go and see the Natural Bridge. It’s a 148 foot span of sandstone and iron ore that rises 60 ft. off the floor of the forest below. It is truly a wonder of God’s creation. The winding hiking paths took us up and down some pretty rugged terrain and we all decided that we needed to be part mountain goat. Ferns were growing out of crevices in the huge boulders and on the sheer canyon walls. It started raining and we just kept hiking. The sound of the rain coming through the leaves was soothing. We really didn’t mind getting wet. The Natural Bridge is privately owned and the owners have left this area as unspoiled and untouched as possible. Its truly a nature conservatory.
Before heading back to the Dismals for the night hike to see the Dismalites we stopped for dinner at the A&W. Now that was a real step back into time. The little diner was so 1950’s and 60’s. We washed our burgers and fries down with real draught root beer floats served up in frosty glass mugs that A & W is so famous for. We returned to Dismals and sat and waited for darkness so we could go back down into the canyon to see the real stars of the Dismals. Dismalites are the glowing worms that infest the canyon walls. These have been known to swarm forth and skeletonize unsuspecting hikers in seconds. Just joking, of course. The worms only eat the brains of their victims.
No, really, there are glowing worms in the Dismals, though they're actually harmless (as far as we know). The worms are colloquially known as the "Dismalites," and they only exist in a couple of other pockets on the planet, and nowhere else in North America. "Dismalite" is a much better moniker than the critter's actual name, which is "fungus gnat" (or Arachnocampa luminosa). The tiny worms are the larval stage of the gnat, and they glow in order to attract other mites and flies to capture and eat.
Darkness fell out there in the Alabama woods and our tour guide David appeared. He was this tall burly stereotypical biker type of guy with lots of tattoos on his arms and a skull and crossbones do-rag on his head along with the black jeans and muscle t-shirt. He took the first group down the path to the caves where the little worms were. We were in the second group. It was hard enough in the day light negotiating the rough twisting and turn paths, now I was doing it with a flash light! We made our way to the caves and turned off the flash lights and the mossy walls started glowing. There were little points of bluish light here and there like little stars in the black night sky. I could not help but think about the Native Americans that used to live within those stone caves and what they must have thought the first time they saw those little points of light.
We made it back to our motel room in Hamilton after 10pm and we were all very tired. My legs were aching from all the climbing and hiking. As a family we had a great first day of a mini-vacation. We learned a lot of interesting historical facts, heard a lot of folk lore that was based on fact and most of all we learned that Nature can live without man but man cannot live without nature.
You can contact me at hallowed_grounds2633@yahoo.com.
