The kids call it Creek Town. To get there, follow the steep footpath through our wooded backyard until you see the warm, sandy beach where the river turns. It’s a great place for sandcastle building. If you came to swim, you’ll have to wade past the “Twin Shark Rocks” with their oval-shaped heads guarding the bank. In the shallow areas, you can shovel sand from the bank and form an island. Upstream there is a mining site where the kids harvest the rich, North Carolina clay to build fairy houses and clay tablets imprinted with crawfish and other artifacts for the Creek Town Nature Museum. Once, there was a frog hotel — a series of linked pools in a clover shape — but it was washed away in the last heavy rain. Every creek swimming hole has to have a rope swing; ours hangs down from a fallen pine tree. If you hold on tight, you can slide around on the flat, smooth rocks below. Some days are better for fishing than swimming. On those days, grab your fishing pole and head down to Creek Town for some catfish, crawfish, small bass or sunfish.

Shannon Mills, Wake Forest, a member of Wake Electric