Editor’s note: The Dart is a weekly feature, where reporters throw a dart at a map of Selma to find a random location for a story.

It may take Ronnie Mitchell’s an hour to drive from his home in Clanton to Paul M. Grist State Park in Dallas County, but there are few places he’d rather be.

Mitchell brought his daughter and two grandsons along to stay in his camper for two nights this past weekend and spend time fishing in the lake or lounging under the park’s towering pine trees.

“I just enjoy getting out. I retired three months ago and I’m just happy watching the water roll by,” Mitchell said. “I’ve always enjoyed the outdoors, and my grandsons like to hunt, so I am getting back into that so I can take them. This weekend, we’ve just enjoyed sitting here and enjoyed the quiet, really.”

Having grown up in Perry County, Mitchell said he wanted to share his lifelong love of the outdoors with his grandsons who have grown up in a world, much unlike it was when he was a child, that is full of DVDs and video games.

“I’m from before the video age,” Mitchell said. “We didn’t have the option of sitting around and playing video games. To me, it’s important to expose them to it and give them the option of enjoying the outdoors. Its important they learn about the outdoors because as our society has changed, we don’t have too many things like this that keep life simple.”

Mitchell’s grandson Devin joined him camping this weekend, and he said learning about his grandfather’s love for the outdoors has shown him the joy found in hunting, fishing and camping.

“I like to just go out there and sit with him in the stand hunting, and I’m getting pretty good at fishing, too,” Devin said. “I do play some video games with my friends, but I’m not really into it.”

Mitchell retired earlier this year from a 37-year banking career that had him working in several communities in central Alabama.

Now that he has more time to spend with family and friends, Mitchell said the success of a weekend in the woods isn’t measured by the number of fish caught or hot dogs eaten, but rather by the number of memories made.

“It’s always fun to see them succeed in hunting or fishing, but they like it and it’s fun to watch them out here,” Ronnie said. “I don’t know if they’ll ever catch as many as me, but they’re getting to be pretty good.”