Caesar Creek State Park

Ahhh Caesar Creek. A fan favorite. And there are countless reasons why. The most intriguing factor being the 2,800 lake surrounded by treeline. If you find yourself boatless (or you lost the hull ID number to your canoe rendering it useless) you’ll be glad to know Caesar Creek has kayak rentals available! We stopped over at the camp store, got our keys to the boat locks, and we were on our way! 

We saw a variety of waterfowl while exploring the lake.. Great blue heron, great white heron, ducks, and cormorants. But today's GEM: a yellow-billed cuckoo! A lifer for me! If you’ve ever heard one, its a very unique sound. Hard to miss. We booked a two hour excursion which we could have freely extended but the sun was hot and we were getting hungry. So we paddled back to shore and looked for a nice spot to enjoy a picnic we packed. The picnic shelters at the beach looked like they were undergoing renovations so we headed for the marina and had lunch on their very nice deck with a view of all the boats. Turns out they serve pizza and other items (including ice cream) at the Marina shop, so we didn’t need to pack a lunch afterall. Oh well! 

Afterward we took a short hike near the damn but ran into some closed trails due to maintenance/downed trees. We visit this park pretty often and this was unusual. Our last stop was the Caesar Creek Lake Visitor Center operated by the US Army Corps of Engineers where we learned about the natural and social history of the area.Its common to assume this park was named after Julius Caesar, but it actually wasn’t. Caesar Creek was named after a formerly enslaved African American man from the 1700s named Caesar. Who became a member of the Shawnee Native American tribe and served as a translator. This fall the state park’s newly renovated nature center is set to open and we can’t wait to come back and check it out!