Tag: #upnorth

Birkie Trail, Next 6 miles

Shirleyjdietz3 Comments

This is the second weekend that we have put on our hiking shoes and taken to the trail. After a week’s work, we really enjoy a good long walk in the woods. We skipped a shorter section in favor of a longer hike than last week. We will go back and pick it up someday when we have less time.

The trees were still more green than colored. There were only a few brilliant ones, but that didn’t keep it from feeling like autumn.

I was a little obsessed with the fungi, but you’ll see why. Strange stuff.

Enough talk. I just want you to see what I saw.

Makwa Trail, here we come.
First spot of color.
The trail skirts this lake except for here, where it gets a little crazy. This is a single track bike trail.

Moss abounds. Lovely, right?
Time for some fungi.
More fungi.
And more…

And this one!

This little guy, about head high on the trunk of a tree, amazing!
Can you spot the camouflaged picnic table?
One more.
No, one more.
Some trail worker forgot their saw.
I spent a lot of time looking at the path because it was always so lovely.
About mile 6 we left the single track trail and did a mile on the larger ski trail. We (the girls) were getting tired and the ski trail was straighter and smoother.



Up North: Fall is Coming

Shirleyjdietz2 Comments

I feel it. What I saw out in the meadow and wetland…

The flowers of fall – we always called them wild asters – the last before a frost. Spots of purple among the greenery.

A lingering daisy, a summer holdout.

The meadow that was a sea of lavender is brown with dried Canadian thistle.

Gold to enhance the purple, drifts of goldenrod… and a flower we called “butter and eggs”

The beavers have built dams to create ponds for themselves.

Heron hiding spots.

Colors and textures of autumn are clothing the land.

Life and death in contrast

The higher water levels (thank you beavers) have caused tree kill around the ponds, but even these silhouettes are beautiful, I think.

Nature’s delicate lace.

Milkweed, nearly ready to burst its seed pods.

Grasses that bend with the breeze.

Water, hurrying on it’s way somewhere

Day sinks past the horizon, taking summer with it. Fall comes peacefully, relentlessly.