BIG WATER

Shade and I spent the morning on Cherokee Lake.  The weather seemed to be favorable for fishing, but there were very few boats on the water to include pleasure boats.  The scenery was really pretty early in the morning with the sky full of clouds.

 The section of lake we would be running on includes two large creeks named German Creek and Ray Creek.  These creeks, in reality, are large bay areas.  They retain the original creek names because the creeks themselves are still on the bottom of the water.  They are covered up by the water in the dam.  They are distinct waterways, however, that retain the old creek nomenclature.  The two creeks together equal an enormous quantity of surface area to cover and I have to move the boat along at a faster pace to get it done.  

Shade was all bright eyed, bushy tailed and ready to go.  There aren't many critters to photograph on Cherokee so I photographed a few pieces of scenery that I found to be especially attractive.  This water is far different than the environment on the river.

Some of those clouds in the above shot are rain clouds.  They are far, far away and will probably cause pop-up bouts of rain.  They shouldn't be a big deal.  The fog is a remnant from the very hare rains we experienced all last night and into this morning.
By the way - the shot above and those that follow were taken on Ray Creek which flows into the Cherokee Lake.

After about four hours Shade turned and looked at me as if to say she needed a pit stop.  Heck - so did I.

 What a sweetheart!

The really nice thing about this morning was the cooler temperatures.  Shade would be comfortable and I wouldn't have to worry about her needing lots of water.  I usually leave her home when the temps reach 90 degrees, but in some cases she seems to end up on the seat of the truck.  I take a cooler with bags of ice and two one gallon jugs of water for her and myself.

It's hard to believe that a little creek runs down the center of this lake on the bottom and the vast amount of water is covering what once was forests and mountains as well as farm land, homes and towns.  Some folks say these enormous reservoirs caused massive devastation to the valleys they were built across.  Others say they brought safety from flood and more prosperous times.  Seems like out of chaos comes wealth and prosperity.  I think it depends on who you talk to.  Some feel differently about it.

She's just taking in the sights.  Pretty girl!

I followed Ray Creek back as far as I dared go.  I noticed a large bird on the top branch of a tree on an island.  At first I thought it was a vulture, but I knew it was a bald eagle.  They are rare on Cherokee Lake for some reason and this is the first one I have seen in a couple months.  I took some sequential shots of this eagle from a great distance.

I initially posted many shots of this bird, but wasn't satisfied with the quality and deleted them all but what you see here.

We cruised around the assigned area and time went quickly.  It was time to head on back into the boat ramp.

 We stopped here for fifteen minutes to enjoy a peanut butter sandwich and a biscuit.  I ate the peanut butter.

The wind was getting a bit brisk and the water choppy.  I set the speed at 40mph to clean out the engine that had not been over idle for three days in a row while on the Holsten River.  We'd be back at the ramp in no time.

 This is her second favorite place to sit when the boat is moving.

This is her favorite place to sit:

And it just started raining again.