Swamp Thang

New Jersey is really an amazing state. We have beaches, mountains, farmland, cities and even a swamp! DBF and I ventured into said swamp on Sunday to poke around, see the sights and hopefully not fall off the path and suffer through the rest of the day with a soggy bottom. This unfortunately happened to a friend of mine on a class trip to the swamp a millennia ago. Poor thing. Her soggy bottom was the target of much joking and laughter during the rest of the trip and is forever burned into my memory.

Some parts looked decidedly...swampy. I was very happy for the pathways that kept us just high enough off the murky bottom (yuck) but not so high that we couldn't see all the cool stuff. Look at all those decomposing leaves. Surprisingly, we saw some animal life when we first entered the swamp, and very little as we progressed further in. I guess these guys just love the attention.

I loved all the different kinds of vegetation. Everywhere you looked was green - except for that murky bottom of course.
Hey look everyone! A thistle! Isn't that a funny word? All I think of when I see that word is a poor little kid with a lisp trying to say it. I can hear him in my head now: Fissle. Thiffle. Tfissle. Poor little guy. What a cruel world it is to have words out there like thistle.

I love the way bark looks, especially up close.
And how cool are these tree roots? Notice that the ground here is very un-murky-like. Some areas of the swamp looked like the first couple pictures and others just looked like the woods.

This was also in an un-murky spot, otherwise I'm sure this tree would be untouched. I shall call it...The Love Tree.

I have a puzzle for all of you. We spotted this blobby looking thing in a tree. What is it? Anyone know?

Here's another one...
And now I will leave you friends, with a picture of a swamp ass. Hardy har har har!!