May 20 - 23, 2023 -- Pine Mountain - Acworth, GA

 May 20 - 23, 2023 -- Pine Mountain - Acworth, GA

F.D. Roosevelt State Park was beautiful.  Here's our site #507.

On Saturday, May 20 we went to Callaway Gardens in Pine Mountain.  This was somewhere I've wanted to go since we moved to the east coast.  Our first stop was the birds of prey show.  We got to see three birds, all of which were not able to survive in the wild.  One of them fell out of the nest and was picked up by humans.  The baby bird then thought it's parents were human, fed and took care of it.  It didn't know how to survive in the wild so was brought to Callaway Gardens.  The other two had a close encounter with 18 wheelers.  One was blind in one eye and the other wasn't quite right in the head.  However, they are all thriving now.

The gardens were a lot larger than I thought it was going to be.  There are numerous hiking trails, the Azalea Bowl, the Butterfly Center, the Memorial Chapel (we didn't get to see the inside because there was a wedding just finishing up),

and the Discovery Center.  We needed to drive between each area.  We went to the Discovery Center first and saw the birds of prey show.  Then we went to the Azalea Bowl and hiked a little through that area.  However, the azaleas had already bloomed, so I was a little disappointed.  I did see one azalea bush that was still blooming.

The trail was pretty with so many different kinds of plants and trees.  There is a lake on the property and a pretty little waterfall.

The Butterfly Center was fun.  First we watched a film about how butterflies come from cocoons that was very interesting.  My maternal grandmother was a school teacher for 40 years.  In the Spring she had a birdcage with cocoons in it and every time we went to her house we ran to the bird cage first to see if the butterflies had come out of their cocoons.  It was fun to be able to walk through the building with the butterflies.  You'll have to click on the first picture to be able to see all the butterflies on the flowers.

There was also some turtles in a little pond and a papaya tree.

Although I enjoyed it very much, I think if I was to go again it would be when the azaleas were blooming.  Otherwise it's just a lot of greenery.  I'm glad we went though.

On Sunday we drove to  Acworth, GA to McKinney Campground.  We've been here many times before with family and have always liked it.  Sunday afternoon there were a lot of boats on the lake and it was pretty noisy, but the weekdays are much quieter.  We always stay in site #89.

There was a pretty sunset Sunday night.

My cousin lives nearby and she came over Monday for a visit.  It was really nice to see her again and get caught up on happenings.

We've enjoyed our trip very much, seen and experienced so many new things.  As always we look forward to the next one.

Roving on...

"In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth".

Genesis 1:1