Trails, Trails EVERYWHERE! I LOVE FALL!

Brilliant Maples and Blue Sky, you can smell the air! I LOVE FALL! I LOVE FALL!!! I've been trying to get out at least once, if not twice a day lately for a good hike. The weather has been spectacular here; the leaves are falling, the colors on the bluffs are gorgeous, the air is dry and crisp and clean, the skies are brilliant blue, the squirrels are busy, and my dog is smilin' every minute of it!

There are literally dozens of hiking trails in the parks around this little town, and all of them have their own beauty. One of my favorite hikes takes me high above a fresh, spring-fed trout stream, through a hardwood forest up into a gathering of some of the tallest white pines you'll ever see. There's a picnic table way up at that top most point where I can lay down and look straight up into those majestic pines gently moving with the wind. It seems each of them has their own personality. It is up there where I feel the closest to my parents, if I listen quietly enough to the wind, they are often in it.
Another of my favorite trails first goes through a wildflower filled field, along another spring-fed creek, over two wooden walking bridges and up into a dense forest. The pathway up into the forest is an old access road for the farm that used to be up there and is covered with limestone rocks, many of which are fossils. This path eventually leads to a grassy meadow lined by brilliant red and orange sumac trees. Every year I'm awed at how intense the red of a sumac can get. Through the meadow and into another one of the area's white pine forests, the trail now a soft bed of fallen brown pine needles. I can see shallows here and there where the deer had bedded down just the night before, or perhaps they very quietly got up just as I was approaching, the scent on the wind giving away my human presence. This huge stretch of bluff land full of trails was given to the city several years ago by a local family. What a great way to share their good fortune with their community.


The trout stream, rich green scents combined with the crispy smell of fallen leaves.

One of the ravines I pass on a trail, always makes me think of the feminine in nature. Someday, you'll see another photo of this same ravine with additions, but you'll just have to stay tuned to my blog to see what I'm talking about doing someday.
One morning, there were literally hundreds of these newly spun webs along each side of the trail, and every single one of them was strung with pearls of dew. It was a magical morning!
Each year I go through the same emotions about Fall, the strongest feeling being, "couldn't it last just a month longer?" That's not to say I don't love the white beauty that winter brings with her, but Fall needs to be appreciated longer; maybe that's why we love it so much, we know how fleeting it can be! So, before the brilliance of the sumac is dulled by the cold and the bright yellow of the sugar maple turns to brown, GO OUT AND TAKE A HIKE!!! (Don't forget the dog and kids!)
Morning mist over the river. The sun is just beginning to burn it off for the day.