With all the excitement that came with the end of 2020, we decided to take a bit of a sabbatical. It was necessary time that we took to explore our actions and motives and to properly adapt and frame them for the road ahead of us. We are overjoyed—and anticipating what the future holds for us with a spirit of discovery, exploration, creativity, and sharing.
The decision had only been made a few days before when we were offered a house sitter for the weekend. We took a quick inventory of the situation and booked an Airbnb. We left on a Friday with foggy details—it was raining, and my work schedule meant we were late getting on the road.
After the engagement, our discussions of when and how to get married frequently drifted towards eloping. A large wedding ceremony, we decided, would be reckless during a global health crisis. And as much as we would like to share the moment with all our friends and family—we do not want them to risk their health to be there. We are sure we’re not alone in thinking a courthouse wedding and a secluded get away would be preferable to hosting a potential super-spreader event.
The point is—we already had the getaway planned.
Ok… We had an outline.
And true to that outline: we were on the road to Griffin, Georgia on a rainy Friday night. As we followed the winding path of U.S. 19 north into middle Georgia our conversation quickly settled into a discussion about our wedding. Many of the major themes had already been formed in momentary conversations. We knew we wanted to have a small service in the forest around our home before our son’s arrival. And that was it—We didn’t know who we were inviting, when we would tie the knot, what we would wear, what we would eat afterward, how to mitigate covid risks, or anything really!
For anyone who has never planned a wedding, there are a lot of minute details and while you don’t have to define them all, you may, at least, want to consider them. We went through the gamut on that drive and still had little more than an outline when we reached our Airbnb. The discussion is ongoing—but we have settled on hosting a small, outdoor service with our immediate family in mid-March. We are looking forward to a beautiful day at the start of spring.
As we neared Griffin our focus shifted, we needed to make plans for the weekend ahead of us. We would use the Airbnb as a base of operations while we explored nearby attractions and wilds. The city of Griffin is located a little west of the midpoint between Atlanta and Macon, west of I-75. It rests right in the middle of the Piedmont Plateau that stretches across Georgia and up the eastern seaboard. Our research of the area found plenty of attractive sites to visit and lead us to make it the outpost of our first adventure of 2021!
We reached the Airbnb and found it to be a cozy little cabin on an old plantation just south of Griffin. While the cabin was adorable and the property beautiful—it was not without its faults. The furniture was cheap and sparse. The climate controls were erratic and often made one room into a sauna while the rest were cold and drafty. But our biggest complaint was the bedding, which was uncomfortable and rolled around on the unlevel floor.
Despite these minor discomforts we were excited to begin a new year of adventures! This would be the first, but we already had many more on the drafting table. With deer season ending, we were eager to get back to visiting our state’s beautiful wildlife management areas and we’re expanding our net to include other natural attractions, such as state parks and national wildlife refuges.
We spent the evening huddled together, trading maps and web pages and negotiating the itinerary for Saturday and Sunday—eventually arriving at a plan that included state and local parks, wildlife management areas, and even a national wildlife refuge. It was a robust list, and we were looking forward to it! But at that moment, we had to get some sleep!
-JCM
Tune in next time for our impressions of Indian Springs State Park, High Falls State Park, and Piedmont National Wildlife Refuge!