Friday, July 15, 2011

Hike Turned into a Walk

First off, let me say that we didn't go where we'd intended to go. We woke up too late, took too long for breakfast, and lost half the day before we were ready to leave town. THAT being said, we still went on a hike, just not to Sunfish Pond, where we had planned to go. We will do that hike next week.


Today, we took the path that runs along the river, then the creek, here in Bethlehem. I'm glad we did, too! We saw lots of neat wild animals. Some we got photos of, others we didn't, but it was a lot of fun. And we got to put our feet into some nice, cool water for a bit, too... and skipped some rocks, and had a generally good time!


I picked some wild berries, and ate them. They were more tart than the berries we get at the store, but I love them just the same.


A few that I picked were actually riper than the ones in the photo, and were even a bit sweet.... yum! They're beautiful, aren't they? 
There were lots of dragonflies, damsel flies, and butterflies all flying around the little marsh on the other side of the trail... I just love watching the glittery wings in motion. And that's also where we saw all the turtles! We saw two baby turtles, which were about the size of a silver dollar. We saw a couple larger turtles sunning themselves on a log, too. The smaller of the two was probably about six months old. The larger was about a year and a half, or so. I used to have a red-eared slider, so I'm basing my judgement off of her size at those ages. They're lovely creatures. Click on the photos for a larger picture to see the turtles better. The babies were tiny! The first image is blown up a bit because it was on the far side of the marsh. The others were closer.



We saw a deer in the woods across from the marsh, but she took off before I could snap a photo of her. A baby bunny was munching on clover ahead of us on the side of the trail, but the photos didn't show much. I got a better photo, marginally, when the bunny hopped away.


It was a beautiful day for a woodsy walk... the sun was out and blazing, but there was a breeze that helped to cool us off most of the time. When that breeze stopped, whoo-boy, it was HOT. This is where we stopped for a time to cool off our feet and skip rocks. I only had one or two really good times where I skipped the rocks out real far, and did over five hops. Keith had more that were good, but he kept finding the really GOOD rocks. ;-)





If we had a canoe, we'd have been gliding across that river in it! It was still nice to walk along side of it, since we wouldn't have seen all the animals, otherwise. We are really lucky to live so close to a wonderful area like this. We didn't even drive there. We walked there. We used an app to determine that we walked around 4-1/2 miles in total. The hike to Sunfish Pond is approximately 6 miles in total, so we know we can do it. (Well, I hope I can, anyway...)
Fresh water clam shells

Mossy rock

I hope you had a nice day today, and took advantage of what nature is around you... and if not, then maybe my post will nudge you out the door to experience your own version of communing with Mother Nature soon. Enjoy summer while you can! Each day is a blessing. 


xox 

2 comments:

-E- said...

wow you saw a lot of wildlife in what you call a "walk". re your comment: i wouldn't worry, nobody really takes solipsism seriously any more. the word's more for metaphorical purposes now.

Terriaw said...

What a cool day! Your hike that turned into a walk looks like it turned into a treasure hunt with all those cool things you found! So fun to see what you can find along the trail isn't it.

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...