I was in South Carolina for two weeks in March, visiting my family in North Charleston. One day I persuaded my dad (Hi, Dad! More photos from my trip soon, I promise!) to take me to the Francis Beidler National Forest. It’s an old-growth swamp forest in the South Carolina low-country with thousand-year-old cypress trees, and it’s quiet. Very quiet. It’s also beautiful. Check out the photos from that walk below.

My dad told me a story of coming to the Beidler Forest after jury duty in a nearby town. A rainstorm caught him as he was out on the boardwalk, and he took shelter on a bench under the lookout deck. Pretty soon he fell asleep, soothed by the sound of the rain on the water and the peace and emptiness. He said that he woke up quite refreshed from this unexpected nap. His story reminded me of all the rainy afternoons this winter when I hung out at Neary Lagoon in Santa Cruz, happy to have the place to myself. There’s something so calming about swamps and lagoons, especially when the rain drives everyone else away.

You can click here to learn more about the Beidler forest (opens in a new window).