Dima called out from behind me as we walked along Elephant Rock Trail. “Look up! Directly above you!” A beautiful red-shouldered hawk was observing us from a fallen tree suspended above the trail. We noticed it had one talon curled up close to its belly. It was a pretty cold day in spite of abundant sunshine so it was probably trying to keep warm.
red-shouldered hawk
It had been over two years since Tim & I took this long, hilly, walk out to Elephant Rock by Morgan Creek. This time Dima, Larisa and Katie joined me. (Finn was at camp.) It looked a little different out there without leaves on all the trees.
looking down to Elephant Rock, Morgan Creek, and my family from the trail
father and daughter decide the climb up to the elephant’s head
see the trunk?
After conquering the rock they couldn’t resist the challenge of crossing the creek on a fallen tree trunk. They kept testing their balances while standing, but finally decided to sit and scooch over bit by bit.
They did it!!!
Larisa and I started heading back down the trail while Dima and Katie came back over the creek and then caught up with us. Watching them cross the creek the one time was more than enough excitement for me!
For this wonderful long walk we went back to the Piedmont Nature Trails and took two different trails this time, part of Oak Hickory Trail which led us to part of Elephant Rock Trail. Of course, we were very curious about Elephant Rock. Much to our delight, we found ourselves in a mixed hardwood forest, which had an abundance of fall color, even if much of it was still green.
Oak Hickory Trail started with a very long stairway
“The [mixed hardwood] forest in this area contains no pines but is made up primarily of oaks, hickories, and maples with understory trees such as dogwood and sourwood. This sloping area has not been cut over in 100 years or more, and it apparently has never been cultivated as the low, flatter areas were.”
“This leaning white oak was split in 1954 during Hurricane Hazel but continued growing.”
close up of the split oak
the oak from another angle
first squirrel encounter sometimes when they’re holding a nut they’ll stay still
so many trapped leaves
pretty hardwood forest
another squirrel
we’re learning to look up to see the brightest fall colors
Elephant Rock Trail had a few stairways, too
while I stopped to examine this little brown jug…
…Tim made it to the top of the stairs
rusty leaves
I found some red!!!
another squirrel
suspended
Elephant Rock on the banks of Morgan Creek — the color of the right edge of the rock kind of blends in with the color of the water
Tim stepped down in front of Elephant Rock to give some size perspective
some reindeer lichen and oak leaves hanging over Morgan Creek
Morgan Creek
little brown jug is also called heart-leaf ginger, Virginia ginger or wild ginger
we met elderly sisters Mabel & Molly and had a nice chat with their guardian, Tom
Back in May 2009 one of the first wildlife shots I got was with my first little digital pocket camera — a red squirrel on Beech Forest Trail at Cape Cod National Seashore in Provincetown, Massachusetts. It was the picture that got me started loving nature photography. I keep it at the top of my sidebar as a reminder of that wonderful feeling.
Over the years, while living by the sea, I grew fond of gulls and see that I have 90 blog posts featuring pictures of them! At the moment there are only 25 posts with squirrels but I have a feeling that number will be increasing quickly. One of these days “gull” will likely disappear from the tag cloud in my sidebar and “squirrel” might appear in place of it. We’ll see.
Gulls or squirrels, they’re both fun to photograph!
