The Bearded Pug

This has been long overdue. I’d like to introduce everyone to my new camping buddy!
Please welcome… Princess Lola Von Biscuit! (Lola for short)

She was a little scared being in a car for 2 hours, but she did finally cozy up to me on the ride home.

We stopped at the pet store before coming home, I let her pick out all her favorite toys and treats.

Took her out in the backyard for the first time and she was exploring but she wouldn’t go far from me.

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Back inside to attack Lamby!

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She’s a sleepy loaf! ❤️

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2025 Hide and seek winner! 🙂

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Her first weekend with me was already an adventure! She got to meet my close friends and a few people at my regular breakfast spot. We also saw some duckies and sniffed my work office and played with some coworkers! ❤️

Happy Camping!
See you on the trail!

~T.B. Pug

P.S. – Lola wanted to say something…
Lola: Woof!

Address: 13200 Bartram Park Blvd, Jacksonville, FL 32258
Telephone: (888) 867-2757
Lat/Long: 30.130517, -81.543106
Website: https://www.jacksonville.gov/departments/parks-and-recreation/recreation-and-community-programming/parks/julington-durbin-creek-preserve
Date: November 9^th 2025
Hardware used for media: Galaxy S22

Bright & early 7:30 AM morning hike. Julington/Durbin is a my go-to spots when nothing else is on the calendar. The flora here isn’t particularly unique, and the fauna were apparently sleeping in. I did have music playing at low volume, though I only do that when the trail is empty.

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I came across a cute little turtle in the middle of the path. I’m terrible at telling them apart — probably a box turtle or gopher tortoise, but don’t ask me. And birds? Forget it. I’m not stopping to look things up mid-hike. 😂 I did move him off the trail. This path gets a lot of bike traffic, and I wasn’t about to let the little guy get run over.

 

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Here’s the north trail cutoff. There are two of these on the loop, which is a nice feature if someone needs to cut the hike short. It’s happened to a few people I know — including me, years ago. (Keep the sound muted on this clip — something went wrong with the audio and it’s not worth fixing a 10-second video.)

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Above, remaining images from my hike, Below,  a video view of the preserve. This is also why hiking in Florida tests my patience — the terrain is completely flat, the scenery does make up for it on a good morning.

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This is one of several rest spots along the trail. No camping allowed here, just a place to catch your breath. I was surprised to see it freshly mowed — last time I came through, the grass was at least three feet tall. I never realized they bring mowers into the preserve!

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And then there’s this. Come on, people — what part of “Leave only footprints, take only memories” is unclear? Keep our land clean. Stop littering! 🤦

 

 

 

Here’s my full track for the hike. This is not a difficult trail. Even at my heaviest, I completed it with a 28-pound pack on my back. You’ve got this! ❤️

Happy Camping!
See you on the trail!

~T.B. Pug

Address: (Parking only) Hiawassee, GA 30546
Telephone: (888) 867-2757
Lat/Long (Corbin Creek): 34.801642, -83.742959
Lat/Long (Tray Gap): 34.799228, -83.691148
Website: https://appalachiantrail.org/
Date: October 10^th – 12^th 2025
Hardware used for media: GoPro 10, Insta360 X3, Galaxy S22

I arrived at 12:30 pm on Friday October 10th in hopes of grabbing a premium spot.  Needless to say, I’m too old for “driving through the night” .  It took about 1.5 hours to get to Corbin Creek (6 miles). Campers were already there setting up. They snagged the prime real estate but the spot I found was perfect, right next to the creek. I had planned to pack up and get out by 7am.

After setting up camp, I took a stroll around the creek to grab videos and also met my neighbors. Nice guys, apparently, they do this (Guys weekend) once or twice a year. It’s a perfect spot for it!

Happened to run across a camper and had to get a pic of his and my shirts. What are the odds two people that have never met before, converged in N. GA on the same night and both be wearing a logo from Florida’s Cape San Blas on the Gulf?

Going on zero sleep & took a short nap then chatted with the neighbors and a few other friends of theirs showed up. They cooked & invited me over, but I wasn’t that hungry. Thanks guys, if you’re reading this! I went back to setup my lights and started writing.

I crashed out around 7/8 pm. The flowing creek, the sound of faint music and kids playing cornhole was quite relaxing, I mean, let’s be honest, dangerous wildlife would likely leave me alone in this scenario. 🤣 

After waking up freezing I opted to use my propane heater. The only drawbacks were, condensation on the lower 1/3rd inside my tent, and it was almost entirely used up in one night. 

I woke up @ 3:30am, stayed up, cleaned the tent and got packed. 

Here’s some shots of this amazing area!

I took a few shots of the camp area in night mode, and also some pictures on the ride up the mountain. My headlights showed how deep the ruts are! I got to Tray Gap at 8am and go ready to head for the trail.

The first mile or so was like climbing a 50 story building but once you make it to the top, the elevations tend to even out. Here’s a few from Tray Gap to Tray Mountain Shelter.

As I passed Tray Mountain Shelter (above me), I came upon the other side of the stream.

 

I also came across a few critters. One’s obviously a millipede, but I don’t know what that beetle is.

2 objectives today, get my Tallulah Falls stamp in my GA Passport and FINALLY try Old Clinton’s BBQ. They were featured on an old Dirty Jobs tv show and just had to visit. Damned good BBQ! I even got the T-Shirts to prove it! 🤣 Also, I grabbed a few images from a different vantage point of Tallulah Falls. And accidentally stamped my passport upside-down. 🙄 Tallulah will be another blog.

Anyway, on to the next adventure!

Happy Camping!
See you on the trail!

~T.B. Pug

Location: Saint Augustine – Historic district
Address: Saint Augustine, FL, 32084
Telephone: 904-825-1000
Lat/Long: 29.892491, -81.311815
Website: https://www.visitstaugustine.com/
Date: September 27th 2025
Hardware used for media: Galaxy S22, Garmin GPSMAP 67i

Decided to check out Saint Augustine at sunrise, (never seen it) along with a nice quiet walk around historic downtown. I arrived around 6am, sunrise was at 7:27am. Strolling through the streets before sunrise was quite calming. And there were a couple of other people jogging & exercising as well.

I got back to my truck around 7:30. My goto breakfast joint in Saint Auggy, Nero’s Waterfront Cafe didn’t open till 8am so  I decided to sit back on the sea wall and take more pictures.  A great spot to eat and enjoy the view. 

They have, IMO, THE BEST corned beef hash.  It’s an odd spot because it’s 3 different things in one building, A café, a bed & breakfast and a Martini bar. Needed a little pick-me-up so I decided to try their Expresso Martini. ❤

When I travel, I tend to pick eateries close to beautiful view.

I called a buddy to see if he was down for some fishing.
Met up with Joe-Cool at Guana (GTM). It was a great day, not too hot at all,  didn’t catch anything though.  Even the people to the right and left of us packed up and left. We decided to jump across A1A and try our luck on the beach. Joe-Cool caught a whiting, but popped off the hook before we could get a picture.

Happy Camping!
See you on the trail!

~T.B. Pug

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Location: Guana Tolomato Matanzas National Estuarine Research Reserve
Address: 505 Guana River Rd #6527, Ponte Vedra Beach, FL 32082
Telephone: (904) 380-8600
Lat/Long: 30.022299, -81.332612
Website: https://gtmnerr.org/visit/
Date: September 20th 2025
Hardware used for media: Galaxy S22

                As many times as I’ve come here I’m always amazed at finding new things.  This is one of my go-to local day hikes.  I arrived extremely early, 6:30am.  I was surprised to see there were already 8 cars parked near the boat ramps and people already fishing off the dam, in pitch black!  Decided to try my hand at some sunrise pictures before heading on-trail.

I’m keeping this short because this is one of my regular hikes, so it’s mostly pictures.  But I did come across several deer on the path.  It’s so hard to catch a picture of them, they get frightened easily.  The morning mist pictures are a first for me on this trail. Loved how the fog just hung out in the open areas.

This trail has a lot of banana spiders!!  As early as I get on-trail, there’s no one that’s walked it yet for the day, sooooo you kinda have to keep swinging your trek pole in front of you in case there’s spider webs you can’t see.  Other than that, it’s a great place for a nice 3 hour, 7 mile hike!

Happy Camping!
See you on the trail!

~T.B. Pug

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Location: Edgar Evins
Address: 1630 Edgar Evins State Park Rd, Silver Point, TN 38582
Telephone: (888) 867-2757
Lat/Long: 36.082730, -85.832353
Website: https://tnstateparks.com/parks/edgar-evins
Date: September 7^th 2025
Hardware used for media: GoPro 10, Insta360 X3, Galaxy S22

This will be a multi-post, as this was my ride back home day, with several stops along the way. 

I woke up to an extremely chilly 52 degrees.  Great test of my new Exped 3 season sleeping bag.  It worked great.  I didn’t realize how cold it was, even with all my windows open or slightly open, until I moved out of the sleeping bag!  Going from 90+ degree temps in FL to the 50’s in 2 days was a bit of a shocker, but a wonderful bonus!

                After I made myself some breakfast (oatmeal and crasins) I noticed while I was eating that the lake was EXTREMELY foggy! Felt like I was in the film “The Mist”.   So I quickly ate my breakfast, packed most of my camp up, grabbed all my cameras and headed down to the water to see what kind of images I could grab.  HOLY HELL, it was so calm and serine, not a single sound.  LITERALLY, you could hear a pin drop.  Course, it was around 6am, and I’m sure I annoyed someone while I was packing my camp up, but ya know what, that’s payback for keeping me up till 1am!!!  This was a quick 30-60 minutes because I had several places to check out on my way home.

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Location: Barnes Creek Falls
Address: None, it’s a F.S. Road!  Use the coordinates.
Telephone: N/A
Lat/Long: 34.825979, -84.582195
Website: https://www.gawaterfalls.com/barnes-creek-falls.html
Date: September 7^th 2025

                HO-LY-CRAP!  I’m so glad I made this a pit-stop!  It was sort of on my way to Tray Mountain (read further down) and I was on the fence about going, seeing as I was already running a bit late.  This waterfall was AMAZING!!!  It may be small, but any falls that I can set my camera(s) right in the middle of, is, in my opinion, a perfect waterfall! On the way up the F.S. Road this creek runs alongside for some ways, and I saw a couple of fly fishermen out in the creek.

Once I got to the waterfall, it was amazing!  I managed to make one video of this fall, which was my sole intent for visiting. *Also located in my relaxation section. (Click the mute/unmute button for audio)

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Location: Tray Mountain Wilderness
Address: None, it’s a F.S. Road!  Use the coordinates.
Telephone: N/A
Lat/Long: 34.831496, -83.677064
Website: https://exploregeorgia.org/helen/outdoors-nature/hiking/tray-mountain-wilderness-area-cnf
Date: September 7^th 2025

                This spot was my main purpose for this detour, I wanted to grab the Lat/Long of a campsite I want to visit next.  If you’re a serious camper in this area, don’t shoot me, I know people try to hide this camp site, because I’ve been googling for the exact location ever since I got back from my section hike in 2024. This is also a continuation of my 2024 AT Adventure, you can view that trek here!

                I marked coordinates of the other sites as well.  They were smaller sites that could fit anywhere from 1 to 3 vehicles and not a lot of space for camping. 

                I failed to take into account was current road conditions.  The path is an 15+ mile, side-of-the-mountain forest service road that’s barely large enough to fit a full-size truck most of the way.  I recorded the entire drive up and down the mountain, it was insane!

                The FS road was pretty bad today, there were holes and divots in the Forest road the size of an adult tree trunk and rocks and boulders the size of a Galapagos turtle!  Most of the forest road was a 90° drop on one side and a 90° cliff face on the other.  The campsite is huge, there’s enough room to park like 10-15 trucks!  Corbin creek  runs right next to this campsite!

I did also make a quick pit stop at Tray Gap. Tray Mountain shelter is quite literally a short hour hike up the path through the trees in the center of  the below image. 

After completing my tasks and feeling very accomplished, I started heading home. It was gonna be a long 6 hour drive. I wound up pulling in my driveway at 12:15 am Monday morning.

Happy Camping!
See you on the trail!

~T.B. Pug

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Address: 1630 Edgar Evins State Park Rd, Silver Point, TN 38582
Telephone: (888) 867-2757
Lat/Long: 36.082730, -85.832353
Website: https://tnstateparks.com/parks/edgar-evins
Date: September 6^th 2025
Hardware used for media: GoPro 10, Insta360 X3, Galaxy S22

                What an interesting evening that was… and unfortunately this will be a short post since I was rained out for most of the day.  The park has a quiet time from 11pm to 6am.  I heard kids and dogs well into the 1am hour.  🙄  Aside from that it was a restful sleep.  Unfortunately, the rain persisted.  I was already on-the-fence about taking my hike on the Clayborn Millennium and Merritt Ridge Trailhead due to the amount of people at this location, but since it was quite literally pouring for most of the morning, my hike was cancelled indefinitely.  I might go back and try this hike on a weekday, considering my last spot in GA was empty on Thursday! It may look bright in these images, but I believe that has to do with my idiocy in not knowing how to change my camera settings. Maybe my daughter can help me with that since she’s into photography. 🧡

                After the rain subsided I decided to take a stroll around the campgrounds and the waterline.  The view was amazing.  And being far away from the campgrounds, the wind drowned out the noise.  It was extremely overcast so the images didn’t quite come out as pretty as I’d hoped, being there was a different story entirely.  The view, the breeze, the nice chill 72 degrees temp… Just perfect!

                After about 3 or so hours, the drizzling started picking back up, so I headed back to camp and rode it out while working on what images, video and GPS routes I had already taken.  It turns out I need more storage on my phone.  Lol  I did bring my laptop, so I ran to my truck and grabbed that to work on.  The rain kept up till the evening but luckily it was light rain.

In its entirety, the park is beautiful.  The restroom was ok, but it wasn’t as clean and nice as Red Top Mountains’.  I would also strongly suggest staying during the week, since this appears to be an extremely family-orientated campgrounds on weekends.

Happy Camping!
See you on the trail!

~T.B. Pug

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Edgar Evins State Park Campgrounds (Day #1)

Address: 1630 Edgar Evins State Park Rd, Silver Point, TN 38582
Telephone: (888) 867-2757
Lat/Long: 36.082730, -85.832353
Website: https://tnstateparks.com/parks/edgar-evins
Date: September 5^th 2025
Hardware used for media: GoPro 10, Insta360 X3, Galaxy S22

                I arrived at Edgar Evins State Park Campgrounds around 11am on Friday, check-in time is noon.  I decided to see if I could climb up this massive Fire Tower to see if I could get a better look at the area.  Apparently, the only time to view the area is in winter, when there’s no leaves on the trees.  🤣

                After I got checked in (and grabbed all my merch… lol) I rode over to my camp-site, #44. I was somewhat disappointed to see hundreds of kids and families taking over the entire campgrounds as I passed by them.  Seems like there was an entire group that registered for like 20 camp sites with like 2-4 families per camp site all right next to one another because they were all friendly and playing games together. 

                I got to my campsite, and it was a beautiful overlook view from the tent once I got my campsite setup.  The spots in the area I was in seem to be dual purpose.  You could essentially park 2 cars on the deck, but I probably wouldn’t attempt it.  There is electric and water connections, but I’m no expert on those since I power my tent with a 2^nd battery.  If you come with an RV, you may need adapters to connect.  The fire pit is located just to the right or left of the deck, right next to the road, depending on which site you get.

                Once settled, I took a stroll down to the lake to take in the beauty of the area.  Unfortunately, my “peacefulness” was obliterated by a ton of kids yelling, screaming and playing as well as dogs barking nonstop.  But I digress, I was there for myself, and for nature.  The waterline and lake with the mountains in the background were insanely beautiful.  I almost forgot about the screaming kids… almost.  lol

                I decided to try to get some kayak time in before it got dark.  The hill behind my camp spot was steep, so I’m glad I brought my Pelican and not the Hobie.  The Hobie does have wheels, but even with wheels, that is a steep grade to try to roll a 60-80 lb kayak down!  The lake was great, it would have been much better without boat wakes.  But that’s asking a bit much.  The scenery however was stunning!  Unfortunately, I’m not gonna upload that entire video to this site, it’s 13GB!  Maybe I’ll try and make YouTube host it since they don’t give a crap about storage.  🤣

                After I got back from my hour yak tour of the lake, I went ahead and made some dinner and chilled in the tent while listening to all the commotion outside I got my cameras ready since I was waiting for sunset to try my hand at a 360 time lapse video of the night sky.  Unfortunately, that cold front was moving in slower than expected but I did get a few images and about 30 seconds of time lapse video.  (*This is also in the Time Lapse section on my site)

                I did try to get some videos of the stormfront moving in over the lake, but for some reason I can’t figure out how to make my Insta360 shoot in night mode.  

                Turned on some tunes and crashed for the evening to the sound of raindrops and Pandora radio. 

Happy Camping!
See you on the trail!

~T.B. Pug

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Address: 50 Lodge Road SE Acworth, GA 30102
Telephone: (800) 864-7275
Lat/Long: 34.140036, -84.711783
Website: https://gastateparks.org/RedTopMountain
Date: September 4^th 2025
Media Resources: GoPro Hero 10, Insta360 X3, Samsung Galaxy S22

                I arrived at Red Top Mountain State Park around 2pm on Thursday.  The drive up was quiet and easy being that it was a weekday.  When I arrived, the ride through the campgrounds was stunning.  There was barely a camper in sight.  The windy roads curve around the lake while passing through falling leaves, it could not have been more perfect. 

                I found my camp spot, number 45, and I quickly realized this was a primitive camping site with campsite 46’s parking spot right next to mine.  Luckily there was enough room for me to park my truck further to the side so that way I could pull out my tent.  The lady at the front office did tell me there was someone else registered that evening in the spot next to mine but I never saw them.  I did, however, have some neighbors the next campsite over, but that was about a block or two away and they seemed like a nice older couple.  I loved their VW Bus!  It had one of those roofs that pops up and I did manage to get a picture, but I gotta find it.

                Once I had camp setup I went exploring.  The lake here is beautiful.  I had an early dinner/snack of crackers, cheese and meats.  I wasn’t that hungry since I was sitting in a car for 6+ hours.  I also took a stroll around the campgrounds and the lakefront, taking many pictures and videos.  The red clay and rocks along the waterline was simply beautiful, but extremely slippery!  So be cautious.

                The evening was also nice and calm.  Aside from the occasional car slowly passing by, no other campers’ setup up near me.  There was, however, a group of campers that had a perfect spot.  A little further down, the path was a camp site that had 4 parking spots together, and the camp was about a 30 second walk onto what appeared to be a small peninsula where up to 5 tents could fit.  I’ve got to research that spot for next time!  It did however start drizzling, but that was expected as I was paying attention to the weather forecasts and that front looked like it was passing my spots in GA and TN by Friday afternoon.  I attempted to get a time lapse video, but it was pointless to keep it, seeing as it was only like 2 minutes long since it started raining more heavily and I had to bring my camera inside.

                That was literally, the best sleep of my life!  I woke up feeling refreshed.  I packed up camp and decided to take one last stroll to the lake and grab more pictures.  The sunrise over the lake and mountains in the background was stunning.

That’s all, I hope you enjoyed the scenery! Come back soon to see more of my adventures!

Happy camping!
See you on the trail!

~T.B. Pug

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