
I thought I might see some good foliage up at Beaver Brook but by the time I got there most of the leaves were on the old abandoned road. But not all of them; I did see some color a little further up the road.

Someone had swept away the leaves on part of the road so you could see the old no passing zone lines.

I stopped at the old bridge over Beaver Brook, which still has its guard rails made of channel iron beams and stout cables.

It’s not a bad place to get a glimpse of the brook as long as you’re steady on your feet.

The beeches were still colorful, which is what I expected.

And the hillsides were full of them.

But of course all the other trees like maples and birches had already dropped their leaves. I used to like moss hunting on the ledges here but there have been some big rock falls so I stay away from most of them now.

I did get close to this ledge so I could show you the icicles, but I didn’t stay long. It was cold in the shade.

The wet leaves below the ledges showed that the icicles were melting.

These were my favorite icicles. That rock on the right with an icicle on its chin reminded me of a skull.

The exposed ledges show that the place is quite literally crumbling away. Much of the stone here is soft, as in feldspar, and it looks like it has shattered. It’s no wonder there are rock slides happening.

The place is slowly putting itself to bed for another winter and once again it will sleep under a blanket of leaves. Seeing them covering the entire length of the old road showed me that.

The brook is slowly eating away the road and evidence of this is everywhere, like in the stilted roots of this golden birch. All the soil has been washed away from them and now the tree hangs precariously out over the brook.

These birches have some impressive root systems but they’re shallow, and the trees do fall over.

I saw a place where I could get to the water without breaking my neck. I noticed that one of the concrete guard posts had been washed up on shore but I didn’t want to think about how the brook would have had to rage to move such a heavy object. They’re about six feet long.

When I reached the water, I looked upstream…

…and I looked downstream. I saw that the brook was being very well behaved and staying within its banks. It isn’t always so. Someday, I thought as I sat here, in the summer when it’s hot and dry and the water is low, I’d like to walk across this brook and explore the other side. The only thing I know for sure about it is that there is a boulder as big as a house in one spot.

I saw an animal den. It looked like maybe a woodchuck in size but I doubted they would dig so close to water. I don’t think they would find enough to eat here. They’re more a meadow or hayfield animal. Or your flower or vegetable garden.

I don’t think I’ve ever seen a frost crack on an eastern hemlock before but I think these warty growths were a healed frost crack. If so, it would now be called a frost rib.

I’m not sure that I’ve ever seen a red maple leaf this color before either. I like it.

What I call the disappearing waterfall usually only runs down this hillside in spring when the snow melts, but here it was running in November. It shows how much rain we’ve had. It’s a pretty scene and I’ve seen lots of people stop to take photos of it.

Once again, especially with all the slippery leaves, I couldn’t talk myself into crawling down the steep embankment to get a shot of Beaver Brook Falls. I did get a side view though. It was roaring.

The old road dead ends and there isn’t much to see after the falls so I usually turn around and head back the way I came. I admired more beautiful beech trees along the way.

And some colorful turkey tail fungi (Trametes versicolor.) They’re doing well this year and I’m glad about that because I like seeing them. There must be a thousand variations in color. I like the blue and orange ones.

I think it was my blogging friend Eliza who asked me last year if I ever saw any bigtooth aspen leaves. I believe I told her that I didn’t but I should have said that sometimes I miss things, because they were everywhere.
The presence of a path doesn’t necessarily mean the existence of a destination. ~Craig D. Lounsbrough
Thanks for stopping in. I hope none of you are seeing any severe winter weather. So far, so good here.