Hiking and biking

Walking one of the paths at the Holden Arboretum

We have been gifted with some amazing weather here in the Bogs.  It hardly feels like November.  Yesterday was simply gorgeous.  Sunny with a mostly clear sky.  Warm temperatures.  Perfect hiking and biking weather.

I could have spent the day working on my fall cleaning.  Or in the garden, finishing up the “putting it to bed for the winter” project.  Instead, I went to the Holden Arboretum for a 2.5 mile hike and followed that with a 7-mile bike ride in Chardon on the Maple Highlands Trail.  Call it an Artist’s Date, although I am far from on track with The Artist’s Way project.

A lot of the leaves are gone from the trees at the arboretum, at least on the periphery.  There are a few maples and oaks still holding their leaves.  The bald cypresses and beech trees are providing beautiful shades of brown, gold, and yellow.  If you venture into the woods, you’ll find a bit more color than on the outer paths.

Ginko leaves scattered on the ground

Benched

Although we’ve had dry weather for a few days now, the ground is still boggy from our record-setting rains.  I wore my Vibrams for the hiking and the biking.  Even though I’ve had them for over a year now, I still find it odd to walk through boggy spots allowing my feet to get wet.  It has an almost playful quality to it, reminding me of splashing through puddles when I was a child.  It is an almost-barefoot experience, and the shoes dry pretty quickly.  Best.  Hiking. Shoes. Ever.

Around Corning Lake

After a short walk on one of the main paths, I ventured off to the woods via the Bole Woods Trail.  The aim was to find the sugarbush area, a beech-maple forest remnant that was once managed for maple syrup production for over 30 years.

I’ll tell you more about that in another post.  In the meantime, I’ll leave you with a few more photos from the main pathways and the trail that leads to Bole Woods.

The tree which moves some to tears of joy is in the eyes of others only a green thing that stands in the way.  Some see Nature all ridicule and deformity, and some scarce see Nature at all.  But to the eyes of the man of imagination, Nature is Imagination itself.

~ William Blake

Though a tree grows so high, the falling leaves return to the root.

~ Malay proverb

A glimpse of the beautiful blue sky

It is day 39 of my yoga and food commitments.  The changes are coming in small increments, yet when I stand back and look at the bigger picture, the accumulation of small changes becomes large.  I’m not even sure where to start when I try to write about it, especially here at Ye Olde Blog.  Perhaps I’ll find the words another day.

That’s it from the Bogs (and the arboretum) for today.  Thank you for dropping by and joining me on the beginning of yesterday’s small adventure.  Watch out for the puddles and boggy spots unless, of course, you don’t mind having wet feet.  🙂

Speaking of puddles, there's one just to the left on the path.

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