My Summer Vacation To North Carolina-Part 4 the Moore's Creek National Battlefield

Our trip was almost complete. As we traveled back to where we started, we had a few more stops to make. We had time because we were going as far as Rockingham, NC. We wanted to be closer to the airport so there was no rushing on Sunday morning.

We headed back to Wilmington, NC. There was a nice nature trail in town which was started by a man named Stanley Rehder. Mr. Rehder was known as "the flytrap man" and was an advocate for carnivorous plants. He transplanted and cultivated Pitcher plants, Venus fly-traps and Sundews all over North Carolina. I read on one of the signs that the Venus Flytrap only appears naturally from 75-100 miles around Wilmington, North Carolina. Outside this area the plants have been cultivated. The yellow and purple Pitcher plants were blooming and very pretty. I didn't see any Sundew plants and the only Venus flytrap plants we saw were in a planter. They are very small and hard to see. I was under the impression they would be much larger.

Our next stop was very appropriate considering on July 4, 2026 it is the 250th Anniversary for the United States. This was a national site for the Moore's Creek National Battlefield. 

 

 

This Revolutionary War battlefield is managed by the National Parks Service. It commemorates the 1776 victory of the patriots over the loyalists at Moore's Creek bridge. This ended the hopes for the loyalists to regain North Carolina for the British. It weakened British control making North Carolina the first to vote in favor of independence.

 

This battlefield is home to the only women's monument of the Revolutionary War. 

 

 

 

 

The bridge where the famous battle occurred is long gone, but the rebuilt version is where the old one was. We talked to a man who was walking his dog on the trail. He said the old bridge was left at the bottom of the river.

 

Another interesting thing about this trail is the swamp. I can't imagine troops marching through these forests and swampy lowlands, especially in February. Being cold and tired in these conditions must have been miserable in this Cypress swamp. We also learned that those root projections poking out of the soil are called "knees".  

 

 At the end of this trail we did see another Venus Flytrap. This was really tiny but they are there if you look hard enough. Locals probably take these for granted but we were fascinated. 

 

 Before we left the area, we picked up another geocache. That made five for the trip. 

 

Now it was time to head to our last hotel in Rockingham, NC and in the morning catch a flight from Charlotte to Appleton, WI. By 3:00pm I was back home. What a wonderful whirlwind.

 

We went 765 miles in 6 days. Two days of air travel and 4 days on the road. My daughter can drive in any type of conditions. There are a lot of loud and fast Dodge cars that thought they ruled the road, but she handled it well. Confession: I was lost most of the time but thank goodness for her and a GPS that worked most of the time.