Our COVID Hikes

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 For weeks, we had a dry spell with relatively cool weather and sun and wind. I spent a whole week watering grass seed twice a day. Then, on a dime, the weather turned and we had buckets of rain. The ground is now soggy, and the air is very humid. We caught New Hope Creek at the end of the dry and after the deluge. 



After a few weeks exploring the Little Creek Waterfoul Impoundment, we started hiking Duke Forest. That first day, we parked on the roadside behind a long line of cars and hiked in. A large timeline sign reviewed the history of the land: clearcut, managed forest, selected cuts. We went down to the river, cautiously stepping off the trail to avoid our fellow hikers. It was a short loop and then back up a different hollow, baby now switched from Susan to me.



The next time, we went across from a Durham park to a lush green bottomland forest, with giant sycamores (a treat in this area) and equally impressive tulip polars and a shurb layer of spice bush and pawpaw and jack-in-the-pulpit and green dragon. New Hope Creek had carved a large cliff on the other bank, and a few houses (and a shipping container and a van) dangled over. On the way back, a pileated made a long low arc around us. This has been a year of pileateds for us. We never saw one down here until New Year's Day of 2020. Since then, we've seen a handful more ... err maybe a basketful, considering their size.

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