Although Memorial Day is a a bit of a somber holiday, to most Americans the long weekend at the end of May is less about death and patriotism and more about celebrating the beginning of summer; about cookouts, parties, fishing trips and other family fun.

For us, last weekend was all bout bonding with our new land and with our pond in particular. We made a fire pit at the edge of the pond, set up some lawn chairs, got a couple of cheap fishing rods and spent most of the weekend, fishing in the pond (unsuccessfully) grilling hot dogs and drinking beers in our newly expanded back yard. We also got a tiny inflatable boat and took turns cruising the pond.

Curiously, the turtle that lives in the pond exhibited quite an interest in what we were doing. If the kids don’t make too much noise, the turtle seems quite at ease with our presence, and when you’re just quietly standing at the edge of the pond (fishing, for example) s/he will occasionally swim over and see what you’re doing.

I had another interesting encounter with local wildlife when I explored the woods next to the pond. I went to collect some rocks for stepping stones across the spillway, when I found a 2-foot copperhead snake.

So now we’re now wondering whether there are any big fish in the pond – there certainly are lots of tiny fish. But even though we did not catch any fish we had a great time trying, and relaxing at the pond, grilling hot dogs over the campfire with the kids and exploring the woods around it.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, June 2nd, 2010 at 6:32 am and is filed under Adventures, North Carolina, Our gang. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.