Summer Wild Flowers

The wild flowers have been just lovely in Tennessee this summer.

Rose Mallow (in the hibiscus family)

Cone Flowers

Milkweed

OK... not a flower.  But isn't it pretty?

An Elephant (Rock) Safari

We've just returned home from 10 days in Missouri.  It was a pretty busy visit but we did manage one day with the kids.

The weather was beautiful so we decided to head south to Elephant Rocks State Park (https://mostateparks.com/park/elephant-rocks-state-park )

We took the left trail which is known as the "Braille Trail" because of the braille markers along a paved pathway.

Climbing up the granite boulders burned off a lot of young energy!

Some energy took longer to burn off than others...

The back part of this section is an old quarry with the blasted out stone and chips leftover when it closed.

It was a perfect day for finding wildflowers to photograph.

An oak tree with new leaves and sneezy-wheezy pollen filled flowers

Little Bird and some tree fungus.

There are many types of lichen growing on the granite stones.

The kids loved them.

We had them bring their iPads to take photos and videos of what they saw.

This fence lizard was a rock star with his paparazzi.

What an interesting trunk on this oak tree!

The quarry pond.

A budding Spielberg working on his video.

Photo op!

We all had a great time and will come back to do the right trail this fall (when the weather isn't melting).

Lake Winona Walk ... photos by Himself

While we were visiting in Winona, MN Himself went across the street for a walk in Lake Park.  He took my camera with him.  I was impressed by the photos he took.

Enjoy the sights along his walking route...

In the background is the famous Sugar Loaf Bluff.  The 'sugar loaf' was created by quarrying in the late 1800s.  The height is 500 feet, with the sugar loaf being 85 feet tall.

The lake as a population of Giant Canadian Geese, a subspecies of Canadian Goose.

They are HUGE.  A standard Canadian Goose gander weighs 8-12 pounds.  A Giant gander weighs 16-20...and up to 23 pounds.

Lake Park is one of the nicest parks I've seen, wouldn't you agree?

A Spring Walk to a Spring

Himself and I decided to enjoy a perfect afternoon to take a walk up to the spring that feeds the lake.

After a half mile we go through this gate  to Lake Three.  Only a mile more to go!

It seems the earliest spring flowers are small ones.  But what they don't have in size, they make up in numbers.  SO many of them.

Every one of them lovely.

The critters are out too.

I would have loved to watch him getting up there, not sure how he managed it.

These metallic beetles are amazing.

Beavers... don't often see them but you really see their damage.  They sure aren't cutting this tree a break.

Starting to green up.  Pretty soon you won't be able to see the forest for the trees.

My favorite tree are the mighty beeches with their incredible root systems.

Sometimes those roots hold surprises.

Like tiny Spring Beauties.

Here's an interesting tree group.

There are eight of them in the grouping.  My guess is they were stump suckers/sprouts from a tree that died a long time ago.

Can you see me down on the trail?  Look on the right side...

A little farther along we found this huge grape vine.  It is so big it has its own knot hole!

LOOK!

There's a rare Tennessee micro owl living in it!  Isn't it amazing what you can see in the forest?  ;-D

And finally, the objective of our trek.  Isn't it a lovely little spring?  Next time out I'm going to clean it up.

OK, time to head back home!