Cahaba Lillies

Lee and I went canoeing yesterday with Laura Graham (her husband, Paul, is a surgery resident with Lee but had to work). The Cahaba River flows near Birmingham and has beautiful lillies that bloom this time of year. We went with a group on a day canoe trip to see them. It was a lot of fun and really cool to see these huge stands of lillies in the middle of the water! We only had to drive about 30 minutes to get there and as we were in the canoe, I remember saying to Lee, "It's crazy that we're in this beautiful place and not even that far from the city." It's so nice to live in a place where we can enjoy nature and outdoor activities without going very far....especially since we have a resident's salary to work with :-) The group only does this trip a couple times a year (the blooming season is short), but fortunately we can rent canoes and kayaks from UAB and go whenever we want!

Lee, me, and Laura ready to head out

First sighting of the lillies

Me and Lee standing in the lily stand

Another view of the lillies from the front of our canoe

Lee with the lillies

A funny story about canoeing...on the way out, we paddled down stream to see the lillies. It was pretty smooth, but there were several parts with small rapids and lots of rocks. We got stuck a couple times and had to shimmy our way out being careful not to flip over. On the way back, you guessed it, we paddled up stream. No problem on the smooth parts but what a disaster when we got back to the small rapids. Lee and I were paddling full force and not moving an inch! Then we would start laughing so we couldn't paddle hard enough and would start floating backwards. At one point, we got turned horizontally across the river and came very close to flipping in the rapid. Most of it was shallow so we had to get out and pull our canoe up the rapids by hand. Talk about tiring! All in all, lots of fun!