May 21st, 2020

You know what these pictures mean, right?  Yes!  Another Photo Safari!  Woohoo!

Normally Joy and Bob would be long gone by now and the camera hikes would be done until sometime in the fall.  Usually at this time of year, Joy and Bob would have already  loaded the kitties into the RV and headed to Yellowstone for the season to be Rangers.  But this year, of course, is different.   Some things are still closed.  Other things are only partly open. And well, this year they will be taking a ranger break.  

Which works out very nicely for me, selfish oinker that I am.   Because now that things are opening up again and, for us at least, the virus scare is backing off a little bit, Joy and I can head back out into the wild. Or at least semi-wild and take photos to our hearts content.

Since I am usually not out happysnapping in forests, parks and preserves this time of year, I had no idea what to expect.  I mean, I know the places, goodness me we've hiked them often enough.  But they look different every season. And it's starting to warm up now and it's a wee bit more humid. But we are intrepid explorers so off we went.

We left a little earlier in the day than usual, knowing that it would be hotter and that was wise. We wore sunscreen and as a precaution bug spray although I really didn't notice a profusion of bugs hanging around, so that was nice.   And because it was still early in the day it was nice and cool and there was a beautiful layer of dew on almost everything.

The dew burned off quickly but was so pretty while it lasted.  And afterwards there were lots of flowers to admire.  Some are fragrant, some are not, but all of them are pretty.  It's such a lovely surprise surrounded by all those many shades of green to see vibrant colours out there in the middle of the wild!  Mother Nature is wonderfully quirky.

We wandered up and down trails, choosing lefts and rights randomly.  Each trail more enticing than the last.  It's a wonder that we never get lost because we really and truly do just make the decision to go left or right at each fork with no regard at all for trail markers.

Some trails were very shady, others quite open and sunny and a few took us past rivers and ponds

We could hear birdsong of all kinds all around us but I was only able to get a photo of one bird.  And that one was being cagey and trying to hide in shadow.  Unfortunately for that particular bird, it's hard for a bright red cardinal to hide totally.

Trees?  Well yes of course. Trees of all sorts. Tall, short, deciduous and palm, healthy and broken, moss or fern covered or loaded with lichens the word I'm looking for is lush.  If you are going to hike in a preserve around here, it will be lush with  trees.

Oh I think before I said something about not seeing any bugs.  That isn't entirely true.  We did see a few insects and the evidence of some thereabouts.  And for some reason there were lots of spider webs.

There were lots of lizards too but this one was the only one who posed for me

So that's it I guess.  First hike since this whole COVID thing began and dang it felt good!  Can't wait to get out there and do it again!

​Thanks for coming along for the walk.  Hope you had a good time ;)