A Day at Lake Manawa State Park

As the temperature continues to fall , sadness and laziness creeps in my house. Regularly checking weekly temperature and then bookmarking sunny days has become a habit now. I love winter especially the time when Mother Nature wraps herself in white blanket of snow but this comes with limitations of being trap in the house.

But finally I got what I wished ! Perfect Sunny Day 🙂

It was nice weather today with sun glowing sharp so I decided to visit Manawa State Park , Iowa. Omaha city shares the border with Iowa state, so Manawa park is approx 20 min drive from my place. I left for the park at around 3 o’clock so as not to miss sun warmth and enjoy the sunset.

Park is vast spanning 1500 acres, so it was quiet difficult to find the main entrance and parking lot (there are so may paid parking, i was looking for free) and as usual GPS sucked . After roaming from one place to other in the park finding for suitable place, found some cars parked at Manawa Beach and children playing in the play area. While parking my Subaru Legacy, I noticed a beautiful dear few yards away.

WOW ! I became still, foot on break, slowly picked my camera from passenger seat, framed the deer and VOILA !!

I put my camera back on seat only when deer went back to woods 🙂 . Parked the car, grabbed my backpack & camera, I was ready for the hike. I started towards the lake which was completely frozen and was giving complement to blue sky. I took multiple shots and even shoot few videos of the surrounding. Atmosphere was so good that trees were kind of illuminated and were reminding me of posters on Window 10.

It was basically a Photographer’s delight. I hiked across the lake but was careful enough not to walk on the frozen lake, didn’t want to perform any action stunt :P. Ground was damp and muddy at few places, I had to be careful enough not to slip. I spent long time near the lake enjoying the beauty of our Mother Nature. Soon I noticed birds returning home and Sun going down, so went towards the beach end to enjoy the sun set.

It was going to be dark, so I started walking towards my car, taking many shots on the way. While at the exit of the park, again notice a beautiful deer trying to drink from the Frozen water, not sure how easy that would be. Life in wild is really very challenging not like ours sitting in heated rooms, drinking filtered water and asking Alexa/Google home to do almost everything for us.

I didn’t want to leave honestly, I really love to be in nature but need to wait for another such beautiful shiny day. Hoping that will come soon. I need a long trip desperately.

What is your favorite place in your local city ? How you like to spend days in Winter especially if you are travalcoholic ?