My visit to Mitchell Lake

The day was Sunday,October,28th,2007. It was a beautiful Sunday afternoon. The weather was nice and the temperature was fairly cool. I arrived at the front gate of Mitchell lake, late that afternoon. The time was approximatly 2:40p.m. As I drove up to the gate I noticed that it was a security gate and that I would need to be granted access to enter on to the premises. There was an intercom, with a button to press so that anyone wishing to enter would need to utilize it for access. I pushed the button and let the voice on the other side know that I was there to visit the the lovely property. The person on the other side of the intercom conveyed to me that there would be a $2 fee per person.I agreed to the fee and the gate was opened. As I drove on to the premises there was a sign of what and what not to do while on the property of Mitchell Lake. Basicly it was a sign that allowed visitor's to be aware of the importance of preserving the property and natural life of Michell Lake. On the left side there was a small parking area ,at which I parked my car. I along with my family preceeded to the visitor's center where we then payed our fees and recieved a map of the property. The women who collected the fees made me aware of the time and reminded me that the center closed at 4:00p.m. By this time it was already 3:00P.M. We were short on time and had a large area to explore. With nearly not enough time we examined the tour map and preceeded out the front door. As we walked our path, we saw a wide open space of landscaping. There were a variety of trees and plants right outside the visitor's center and little signs in front of each to show their names. My children and I enjoyed the the scenery of the lovely plants and trees at sight. My two son's especially enjoyed the fact that there was a wide open area to run around in. We then walked over to my vehicle and got in. As I began to drive furthur in to the Mitchell Lake property, we noticed that the road was very narrow and bumpy. It wasn't long before we could see the actual lake and felt the down home feeling of mother nature. While we still had not seen any birds or animals we heard the sounds of snakes hissing in the wild, along with the sounds of crickets. As we were still in the car driving these sounds were somewhat alarming, since I am not a outdoorsman. While the drive was thrilling and adventuresome I was a bit confused on the path we were on. Although I had a map, I was not sure that we should continue furthur in to the property, since we were pressed for time. I decided to go back to where we started. As we turned around and went back towards the gate we saw a hawk circling the sky. This was about the only sight of animal wild life out at Mitchell Lake, other than the sounds of Crickets and Snakes. As we got closer to the front entrance we decided that we were not going to give up on seeing some other wildlife and I parked my vehicle once again and walked onto a path right behind the Visitor's center. By this time we were all pretty much worn out from just attempting to get a good grip of nature. Honestly we knew it was much too late to see and appreciate much more than we had already experienced. We, however did continue to walk and explore what we could. We saw nothing more than lots of grass, trees and branches.Although we did see some colorful butterflies and Crickets , we did not reach our destination of either pond. My ultimate destination was Bird pond where I am sure my little boys would have enjoyed. I could only imagine the different kinds of species of birds that we could have seen and experienced. Our self tour at the Lake was not what it should have been but if we had arrived on time we might have seen more of what we were expecting to see. Never the less, it was a genuine adventure of nature. Mitchell LAKE is a lovely place to visit so as long as you give yourself enough time to explore. What we saw was worth the time and energy. The atmosphere brought on a sense of connection to the natural world.