Return to the Scene of the Crime*: The Carolina Bay

“Bald Cypress in the Fall” November 2019

*Because I return so often to a few different places around Aiken, SC, this will be a recuring theme throughout my upcoming posts.

Hello,

One of the big advantages of spending a lot of your photo time locally, is you get to know some areas very well. Some people might think that is kinda boring, and say to themselves, “Once I’ve photographed a place, what else is there to see there?” I was of the same mindset for a bit. That was until I discovered this park on my way home from work one evening in the fall of 2019.

The Carolina Bay Nature Preserve is only a 24-acre natural wooded park, with a large pond or bay in the middle. Even though it is in the middle of a mostly residential area and right across the street from the most well-used park in Aiken, few people seem to know about it. Because my first photo visit was in mid-November, I was struck by the cypress trees that turned this wonderful color of red. I photographed this first time about an hour until I ran out of light. And decided to get up early the next morning to explore more.

That next morning, I walked around the water, and found and photographed one of those amazing cypress. That image is still one of the most popular I’ve ever taken. I could have told myself to stop going back because I got “The Image” from this place. But since I learned cypress are one of the few conifer trees that change color and lose there leaves in the fall – thus the bald part of the cypress name – I thought I would try to get an image from each season.

These returns over the seasons, and then years, allowed me to really start noticing some things about the Bay. One of the first was there were a lot more cypress in the park then I thought. So, I started to photograph them at different stages as well. The next thing was that the water level changes – a lot. Heavy rains fill it up and the water can sometimes reach the walking path. Other times it has been so low and dry, I could walk out to places that normally would be under water, and get images from a totally new angle.

The first few years, I didn’t venture far from the water and the cypresses. Even though there was another path through the more wooded area, it seemed too overgrown for me, and I didn’t often find images I was drawn to. That was until the fall of 2024 when Hurricane Helene blew through the area and toppled and delimbed many of the trees in the woods. (All the cypress did just fine interestingly.) I am now exploring and finding unique images in these areas as well.

Though, what returning to the Bay so often has really shown me, is how fragile and ever-changing nature is. And how amazingly lucky I was to get that first image of in 2019. As I said earlier, I wanted to get a nice photo of the tree in all four seasons. Summer has been the most difficult. In July of 2021, I was trying one day, but didn’t like what I got. So, I decided to return the next week. But when I got to the spot, I saw another tree had fallen over in a recent storm, and fell right on the cypress. In fact I couldn’t even see it because of that fallen tree’s foliage.

The first thought that crossed my mind was I would never get any more images of this really cool cypress, because some boring, other tree fell on it. And that I should just give up on my project of the seasons. But a few days later I realized that if the one tree had fallen, maybe it would break up over time. And more importantly, since I thought of this tree as my friend, why would I walk away from my sick and injured friend? And if it would let me, I’d document it’s recovery. Which is what I have done since.

If I had not been visiting, exploring and getting to know The Bay, I would not have seen these transformations as they happened. Or if I was only going by every few years, I might think the place had fallen apart, and not worth my time and effort now. But I am glad I keep going, because each season and each year I continue finding and creating new images that become some of my favorites.

So, my challenge to you all is to find a place – large or small – and call it your own for a while and see what you discover about the place, about your art, about nature and, most importantly, about yourself.

Thanks and keep creating what you do.

Patrick Krohn