If you want to immerse yourself in nature the High Blue Trail in Walpole, New Hampshire is a good place to do it. Immersed in nature is my favorite condition, so I chose to climb here recently.
The trail from the start to the overlook is all uphill but it’s a gentle grade and a short climb.
Coltsfoot coltsfoot (Tussilago farfara) leaves reminded me of spring, which seems like it happened just a couple of weeks ago.
Before you know it you’re out of the woods and in the meadow. You have to walk through here to get to the second half of the trail, so it’s kind of a midway point. I was glad that it had been mowed. I’ve been bitten by ticks 3 times this year.
I stopped to admire the marginal wood ferns (Dryopteris marginalis) that grow along the meadow’s edge. Many ferns are already starting to yellow but these are evergreen.
The round spore producing sori growing along the margins of the leaflets (pinnae) told me that this was marginal wood fern. Just before the spores are ready to be released the sori turn bluish purple, so I’m going to have to try to remember to watch closely.
Striped maple (Acer pensylvanicum) showed how it came by its name. It is also called moosewood because moose will often eat its bark in the winter. It is said that Native Americans used this tree’s fine grained wood to make arrows.
Jack in the pulpit (Arisaema triphyllum) stops photosynthesizing early but its green berries will continue to ripen to red even after the leaves have withered. It could be that the plant sheds its leaves to put more energy into fruit production.
Every time I come up here I have to stop at what’s left of the old fieldstone foundation and wonder about the people who once called this place home. I know nothing about them except that they were hard workers.
And I know that by the stone walls that they built and the land that they cleared as they built them, probably by using a single axe. What is now forest was once open pasture and chopping that pasture out of old growth forest must have been near back breaking labor.
I’ve always wondered if the small pond near the foundation was their source of water. I’ve never seen duckweed on it before but it was almost covered with it on this day. I wonder how it got here. Ducks, maybe? I often hear them up here.
I realized that I’d gone through life up to this point completely ignoring duckweed, so I got down on all fours at the pond’s edge and reached out with the camera in one less than steady hand to get this close up of it. Since then I’ve learned that these are the smallest flowering plants known, with some flowers measuring only .012 inches (0.3 mm) long. I’ve also learned that if duckweed covers the entire surface of a pond for an extended period of time oxygen depletion happens, and without oxygen fish die. Duckweed can also kill submerged plants by blocking sunlight, so these tiny plants can have a big impact.
The paint seems to be weathering off the summit sign quickly now. It can be very windy up here but the sign is protected by the tree it’s on, so I doubt that it’s the cause of it.
It’s a good thing I don’t climb solely for the view because I’d often be disappointed. This day was very hazy, hot and humid and the camera just didn’t seem to like landscape photography. Still, you could see Stratton Mountain across the Connecticut River Valley in Vermont. On a day so hot it seemed hard to believe that they would be making snow over there soon, but they’ll expect full lifts on Thanksgiving Day, which is November 26th.
Zooming in on the hills made things even worse but the view, though hazy, was very blue, as it always is. Since blue is my favorite color I was happy with it.
I’ve learned that when you pay attention to the little things in life like these beautiful clover leaves, the big things take care of themselves, and some even disappear altogether. I often end these walks feeling as if I don’t have a care in the world and, after walking regularly for a while, I now feel that way most every day. Living is easy once you’ve learned how.
I saw a large piece of tree bark beside the trail that seemed strangely colored but because I’m colorblind I couldn’t really tell what colors I was seeing. It was only when I used my color finding software that I found salmon pink, India red, sandy brown, sienna, rosy brown, gray, and even peach puff. I wish I had turned it over to try and figure out which kind of tree it came from because I’d really like to know what trees are hiding such beautiful colors on their inner bark.
I took a trail that I’ve never taken before on my way down. It looked like a game trail at first but it quickly became too wide for that. A stone wall crossed the trail near a glade full of ferns and when I stopped to look at a piece of milky quartz in the wall I spotted a dinosaur standing guard over 4 or 5 coins. I can’t speak for the age of the dinosaur but the coins were old enough to have to decipher them by size rather than the markings. I made them out to be about 61 cents worth. As I walked on I had to smile to think of a little boy or girl loving this place enough to leave their favorite toy and the loose change in their pocket as a thank you gift to nature. I hope they’re still as thankful at 70.
It’s all still there in heart and soul. The walk, the hills, the sky, the solitary pain and pleasure–they will grow larger, sweeter, lovelier in the days and years to come. ~Edward Abbey
Thanks for coming by.
I think if I had those views near me it would become my favourite walk. I love the mystery of the dinosaur and that tree bark too.
Yes, that is a favorite walk and I’ve done it many times. I haven’t seen many dinosaurs though!
A lovely little story in that final photo and your words. 🙂
Thank you Ben. I’m hoping to get a photo of those shrubs when they are all pink. It’s quite a sight!
Do we have crossed wires here? The final photo was about a dinosaur’s dragon’s hoard.
Qops, sorry Ben. I thought your comment was for the current post. I must be a little discombobulated this morning. I’m glad you liked the last post with the dinosaur!
It happens to us all. 🙂
What a great find. I’ve never found a dinosaur on a trail before!
Thank you Wendy. I haven’t either!
I think it only right that distant hills should be blue; it is such a calm, serene colour and that is how one wishes to feel when looking out from the top of a hill or mountain after a climb. ‘…those blue remembered hills’ the poet Houseman wrote about, are sights we all keep in our hearts.
I agree Clare, though in this particular spot they seem bluer than they do on other climbs. I’ve never been able to find out why. Maybe it’s because the view looks to the west while most of the others look south. In any even they really are beautiful!
I think you could be right about the direction.
What a lovely post – dinosaur, coins and all. Thanks for reminding me of the name of one of my favourite ferns — the marginal fern.
Our jack in the pulpit’s berries are now red. such a striking red it is, though the leaves are still nice and green. (We’re in a heat wave, so tomorrow – who knows?)
Thank you Cynthia. Interesting how your Jack in the pulpit fruit ripened so fast. Ours are nowhere near that stage.
I feel like we’ve been in a heat wave all summer here. Just one hot sunny day after another and now we’re in a drought. I hope it rains soon!
I am new to your blog and love your posts. Nature and all of the outdoors means everything to me. I’m fortunate to live out in the country on 20 acres of wooded land with a wildlife pond. As soon as I drive in the driveway, a calming feeling comes over me. It’s the most peaceful place I’ve ever known – so good for the soul and wonderful to call home. We have many old foundations and stone walls in our area like the one’s you took the picture of. I spend a lot of time walking around these foundations. This may sound strange, but I find if I stand long enough, I can almost hear the sounds of the people that lived there. Many of these old foundations date back to Civil War days. The people came to this area for a better life and then the the war broke out and the men and boys left to fight. It was impossible for the women to keep the farms going alone and many were abandoned. Forgive my rambling – I really just wanted to say how much I enjoyed the beautiful photos from your climb. The little dinosaur with the coins restored my faith in mankind – the years that they have been there untouched is heartwarming. I look forward to following you, your stories and your photos in the future 🙂 .
Thanks very much Ginny. It sounds like we live in much the same kind of place. I live in the middle of a forest so I don’t have to go too far to find nature. I also love it and like you find it very calming.
Yes, if only these old foundations could talk! I love exploring them and trying to figure out what went on with the land. They were hardy souls, that’s for sure.
Thanks for stopping in. I’m glad you’re enjoying the blog.
I do love a good hike with a bit of elevation that gently climbs, this was such a wonderful outing…The photos from your trip are a real treat.
I think you’d probably like this one then, Charlie. It’s very gentle and doesn’t take much out of you.
The best things are the little things. Lovely post!
Thanks very much, I’m glad you liked it!
The blue views were delightful in spite of the haze.
I’m glad you liked them. It’s always very blue up there.
Such a nice walk!! I never thought of duckweed being rare. We even have a cypress swamp southwest of here. It’s a nature preserve. The water doesn’t look like water because of the duckweed covering the surface. Sometimes swimming snakes leave a S’ing trail through it.
I’m not sure that duckweed is rare here either but I never see it. I’ve read that ducks eat it.
That’s interesting about the snake trail!
I found pictures of the cypress swamp about 50 miles from here and am working on a blog.
I look forward to seeing it. I never got to see one in Florida.
I’m working on the blog now. It’s so nice to see the pictures. The scary part is the poisonous cotton mouth snakes.
Yes, they’d be enough to keep me away!
AT least they have good trails there and a floating boardwalk that goes out into the swamp a little ways. My blog has 14 pictures in it … not text yet.
I’m looking forward to seeing it. That’s a long one for you!
I don’t have it quite finished yet. It’s been such a joy to go back through those times. It is an amazing place!
Yes, you can see things in a cedar swamp that you can’t see much of anywhere else.
I never heard of a cedar swamp, unless it’s related to cypress.
Actually they are closely related but I was thinking you said there were cedars in that swamp. Either way, it’s a rare place with rare things in it.
I might have goofed. It’s been overly wild around here the last few days. It it weren’t so hot, I’d run off to the hills.
It’s not everyday when one stumbles upon a dinosaur, that’s really immersing yourself in nature! 😉
Lots of interesting fact in this post, I never paid any attention to duck weed either, and knew nothing about it until your post.
I think that there are a number of species of trees that have very pretty colors in the inner bark, but I can’t remember which ones, and I’m not about to strip the bark from living trees to find out. I think that piece of bark you found is from a red pine, but there’s far more probability of my being wrong than right. I’ve seen similar colored bark before on the ground at Round Lake Campground, and that has mostly red pines in it.
People did work a lot harder back in the old days, they were chasing a dream, freedom, combined with the necessity of eating to stay alive. Those two things will motivate about any one.
The dinosaur was a real surprise. That’s a first!
Duckweed is easy to forget about I think, until it happens to appear on your pond.
That bark could be from a red pine. I’ve never seen one it that area but that doesn’t mean that they aren’t there.
Yes, both starvation and being owned by a king or queen would be strong motivators to get something done in a hurry!
Looks like a lovely place with a bit of history. Time spent in nature allowing yourself to quietly become part of the place cures most of what ails me.
Thank you, it is a great place and you see very few other people there. I agree-it’s hard to feel bad about much of anything when you spend time in a forest.
OMG, I thought that mini dino was real. Another blogger drew that spotty fern thing in Calif. and I was wondering what it was – good to see it here. Thanks again, great stuff.
You’re welcome. If that dinosaur had of been real I’m pretty sure that I wouldn’t have been taking its picture!
Now is the time of year to be turning over fern fronds. They won’t all be producing spores but many will. The sori are very interesting. Some look like tiny baskets of flowers.
Oh, my! What a delightful post! I wonder if the bark might have been from birch? They can have some of those colors — but I expect you’d be more likely to find a whole birch on the ground than just a fragment. I loved the commentary about paying attention to the little things in life. And I’m still smiling inside to know that a wee dinosaur is still faithfully on guard over its small precious stash in the woodland. 🙂
Thank you Pat. I don’t know why the bark couldn’t have come from a birch. I think all trees have surprises for us, but I don’t usually expect to see pink.
I really do find that paying attention to the little things make the big things go away. I just wish someone had told me that years ago!
I’m thinking that the boy or girl who left the dinosaur will probably grow into a real champion of nature. We could always use a few more of those!
I spontaneously wound up wandering around my backyard and woodland this afternoon, camera in hand. For me, it’s always kind of a meditation, being hyper focused on what is at hand. And the rest of the world falls away. I even forgot that it was hot and growing more humid. Most of my observations were also of little things that together all make up the whole.
That sounds a lot like how my walking trips go. It’s hard to focus on much besides what’s in front of you, and that’s a good thing. I don’t think I’ve ever worried about anything while in the woods, except for the one time I got lost.
Fabulous photos and words, Allen. I love what you said about paying attention to the little things in life, and about how good you feel after being in the woods. Very nice. Have a wonderful day!
Thank you Paula. I’m guessing that you probably feel the same way, so I’m sure you know what I’m talking about.
I just checked the hawthorns the other day and still didn’t see any ripe haws. I never knew they took so long to ripen!
Beautiful pictures and words. Thank you. I’m new to this site, told about it by a fan of yours!
Thank you and welcome to the blog. And thank you to the fan who introduced you to it!
Now that the pond has duck weed, you will be able to watch as it takes over. It won’t take very long. It is almost impossible to get rid of. I’m happy for you that your climbs leave you feeling restored.
Thank you Laura. Yes, restored is a good way to put it!
I’m hoping the ducks eat all the duckweed but I don’t suppose it works that way. It would be a shame if it ruined that little pond.
You are a great philosopher, it is always calming to read your posts.
Thank you Susan. I don’t know too much about philosophy but it’s nice to hear that these posts are calming. I find being in nature very calming so I’m glad it carries through.