But since July ended, it's been a lot different. We have gotten together several times to enjoy summer and the great outdoors. Visits to some of the area's national forest campgrounds and parks provided some indelible memories. Nothing too exotic, mind you. But to us, it was fun. It was our speed.
What did we enjoy most of all? That's easy: Walking on trails near (or around) wooded lakes. These trails are for foot traffic only--they aren't speedways for four-wheelers or other kinds of off-road vehicles. So, thankfully, no background racket of revving engines except the occasional whine of a chainsaw off in the distance. The trails are somewhat narrow and hilly in places. But they are really user-friendly, especially in late summer when the mosquitoes aren't so hungry.
This is northern Wisconsin: plenty of lakes and lots of green. In another few weeks, the leaves will turn gold and red. That's another a great time for hiking. The fun times finally end; Old Man Winter arrives sooner or later and stays for a long, long while.
But that's off in the future. During late summer we had some fantastic walks in the woods. I took my camera--maybe you would like to see some of things we saw.
What we saw were the woods ...
The woods are lovely dark and deep--even when it isn't a snowy evening. On the trail, we were by ourselves, Mother Nature our only companion. A bird's song, a chittering squirrel--they provided the commentary as we walked along. Another view in the woods ...
With so much nature around and no other humans, we got back to nature, too. The weather was warm, and we didn't need much coaxing to shed superfluous clothing. Once, we took off everything but our shoes--the better to enjoy a cool breeze on a warm day while protecting our feet from tree roots. It's no big deal to us; we both like being nude, though we're practical about it. Even when we stayed fully dressed (most of the time), our clothing was loose and light.
After a while we decided to sit down, admire the lake scenery, relax and talk quietly. Time stood still. We were in no hurry. Who would want to hurry away from this? ...
A minute or two after I took this photo, as we were talking, some other hikers came along. We said hi. They said hi. On they went.
For many, many years, K had a painted turtle for a pet. As we sat looking over the lake, she spotted a turtle, making the most of a log on a sunny day ...
During last week's walk, we saw another turtle. While this one stayed mostly submerged, it came up for a look-see ...
We saw some other wildlife, too. Dragonflies were flitting here and there ...
I wanted to get pictures of loons. We heard loons calling during our first hike but never saw any. During our second hike, we never heard a loon's call. But K saw one on the lake, far, far away. My camera was able to close the distance ...
This loon wasn't calling because it had more important things to do: fishing. It would dive below the surface and disappear for a long time. Finally, it would pop back up some distance from where it disappeared.
The loon was a good angler. Zoom in on the photo above. What do you see? ...
It was dinner time--a fish was disappearing down his throat as I took the photo.
We walked on, following the trail near a bog with a boardwalk on one side. A lovely place--that's where I got the dragonfly and turtle shots. We looked around there for some time. Who's in a hurry? We sure weren't. ...
Such a nice day. So peaceful, so pleasant. We went to a beach after our mid-August hike and swam in the lake for over an hour. The water was too cool after our early September hike, and so was the air. So we simply sat on the shore by the beach (near where the loon had his meal earlier) and looked out over the water, seeing where we had rested earlier. We talked for a while, and we sat quietly.
We will probably go on more nature hikes this fall. It will be cooler, and it could be jeans-and-jacket weather. But the leaves will be in living color, posing for my camera.
Fun times in the woods, and the show's not over yet.
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