In our little corner of southern New England the fall colors don’t peak until late October and we don’t expect the first frost before the 22nd. That makes it difficult to give much of an autumn flavor to my Walktober post. But since we never got to the gardens at Harkness Memorial State Park this summer I decided to go with it and contribute a garden walk this year.
This is my third annual Walktober post with Robin over at breezes at dawn. 🍁 If you would like to see my previous Walktober posts please click here. 🌼
When we arrived at the park there was a huge flock of starlings making quite a racket, darting from tree to tree and to the water tower en masse. Tim estimated that there were hundreds of them.
The gardens surrounding the Eolia Mansion still had a summery feel to them with many flowers in full bloom and many buds making plans to blossom before the frost comes.
bug matching the center of the flower
view of Long Island Sound from one of the gardens
I believe the nicest and sweetest days are not those on which anything very splendid or wonderful or exciting happens but just those that bring simple little pleasures, following one another softly, like pearls slipping off a string. ~ Lucy Maud Montgomery (Anne of Avonlea)
10.16. 22 ~ Historic Jordan Village Green Waterford, Connecticut
Heading for home, feeling vaguely disappointed about the lack of fall foliage, Tim spotted a bit of bright orange across the intersection as we were waiting at a traffic light. When the light changed we went for it and discovered Jordan Village Green, which belongs to the Waterford Historical Society.
And so we took another walk!
1740 Jordan Schoolhouse
Beebe-Phillips House
Most of the trees still had green leaves but there were enough trees turning to autumn colors to satisfy my cravings that day. 🙂
falling leaves gather rusting spokes left motionless an abiding tree ~ Barbara Rodgers (By the Sea)
Margaret W. Stacy Memorial Barn
Ralph Madara Blacksmith Shop
The buildings were deserted, except for two blacksmiths we found busy at work in their forge. The man above was working on an axe head. They were pleased to show us their tools and creations. We were delighted to find the perfect holiday gift for someone on our list!
How smoothly nature’s vast machine whirs on with all the big and little cogs revolving in their places! Each seed and bird and flower and fly, in its apparently haphazard existence, plays its part in the output of the seasons. ~ Edwin Way Teale (Circle of the Seasons: The Journal of a Naturalist’s Year)
a rustic birdhouse on the corner of the schoolhouse
cirrocumulus clouds, forecasting the coming rain
Now that late October is arriving we have much more of this delightful season to enjoy! And a few more walks, too, between the rainy days.
A gray catbird greeted us when we got to the Ebenezer Avery House at the bottom of the hill at Fort Griswold. The last time we visited was in January a year and a half ago. Of course there was nothing growing in the small garden at that time. But this time the air was filled with a pleasant fragrance that must have been some herb or flower I didn’t recognize.
We had a nice walk all around the fort and then it was a delightful surprise to find this little front yard garden surrounded by a picket fence. We lingered here for quite a while, enjoying the colors, smells and visiting butterflies. The flowers were in all stages of life, new ones blossoming right alongside the fading beauties. Please enjoy!
eastern tiger swallowtail
monarch
After we had our fill we made our way back up the hill and past the fort to our car. It was a good workout. 🙂
looking up the hill to the fort
I started to imagine what the people who were in this house during the Battle of Groton Heights might have witnessed from their vantage point that tragic day in 1781.
6.11.22 ~ Lyman Allyn Art Museum, New London, Connecticut
When I read about a new Poetry of the Wild outdoor sculpture installation at the Lyman Allyn Art Museum it seemed like a great opportunity for a “new” place walk. So off we went, four days after Tim’s surgery. It’s hard to believe how much energy he has now!
close up of mini-garden by the entrance to the museum
It was one of those beautiful June days with bright sunshine, blue skies, greenery everywhere, low humidity and perfect temperatures. To get to the sculptures and poetry we walked down a grassy hill, enjoyed the antics of a catbird (they’re everywhere this summer!), crossed a picturesque wooden bridge and found ourselves in a lovely garden.
garden at the rear of the Deshon-Allyn House
rear of the Deshon-Allyn House
gray catbird
It’s hard to see in the pictures below but part of the sculpture is branches growing up out of the chairs. It’s difficult to distinguish them from the branches of the tree behind them.
“Forest Dialogue” by Ana Flores
There were three poems on display like the one below but because of the angle of the sunlight the camera couldn’t capture the other two. But this poem touched me, especially at this point in our lives when it would be nice to find it possible to live it all over again.
“I Will Want to Love You” by Michael Bradford
American robin
tulip tree blossoms
tulip tree blossom
summer sky
red maple seeds
buttercup and bug
I ask you to pass through life at my side to be my second self and best earthly companion. ~ Charlotte Brontë (Jane Eyre)
When the hot an hazy days of summer land on us it will be nice to think back on this lovely day shared with my best friend. ❤️
A week after our last visit we returned to the pond at the nature center to see the nesting Canada goose again. Our first encounter was a mallard bobbing for food.
Mama goose was still sitting on her nest. 🙂
Papa goose eyed us and started swimming towards us.
But I continued with my photo shoot…
…until he decided to come even closer and make his point.
He came out of the water so we backed away and gave him some space, while continuing to take pictures. No need for a confrontation.
And then the mallard decided to come out of the pond, too. They seemed to be friends, nibbling on the same patch of moss.
violet (?) growing out of a crack in a big rock
On our way back to the car we spotted another trail that seemed to lead toward the Denison Homestead, a historic museum across the road from the nature center, where the daffodils were still blooming. We followed it to a crosswalk which led us to a great picture-taking spot.
4.11.22 ~ Denison Homestead
I never saw daffodils so beautiful. They grew among the mossy stones, about and above them; some rested their heads upon these stones, as on a pillow for weariness; and the rest tossed and reeled and danced, and seemed as if they verily laughed with the wind that blew directly over the lake to them. ~ Dorothy Wordsworth (Journal, April 15, 1802)
She wore her yellow sun-bonnet, She wore her greenest gown; She turned to the south wind And curtsied up and down. She turned to the sunlight And shook her yellow head, And whispered to her neighbor: “Winter is dead.” ~ A. A. Milne (Daffodowndilly)
spotted this periwinkle on the way back to the nature center
We plan to come back every week, hoping to catch the goslings swimming in the pond one day. The average number of eggs is five and the parents take them to a brooding area soon after they hatch. I hope the brooding area is nearby so we don’t miss seeing them.
But from Labor Day through Halloween, the place is almost unbearably beautiful. The air during these weeks seems less like ether and more like a semisolid, clear and yet dense somehow, as if it were filled with the finest imaginable golden pollen. The sky tends toward brilliant ice-blue, and every thing and being is invested with a soft, gold-ish glow. ~ Michael Cunningham (Land’s End: A Walk in Provincetown)
1.19.21 ~ Fort Griswold Battlefield State Park Groton, Connecticut
Near the end of December we found the graves of a couple of Revolutionary War soldiers on a walk in Stoddard Hill State Park. Debbie, one of my readers, mentioned that they don’t have graves that old where she lives in Illinois. So, although I much prefer nature walks, I decided we could change things up a bit and take a history walk. Because of Debbie’s comment I have a new appreciation for the historic Battle of Groton Heights that took place right here in my town. (Link is for history buffs.)
DEFENDERS OF FORT GRISWOLD • SEPT • 6th 1781•
This is the historic site where, on September 6, 1781, British Forces, commanded by the infamous Benedict Arnold, captured the Fort and massacred 88 of the 165 defenders stationed there. The Ebenezer Avery House which sheltered the wounded after the battle has been restored on the grounds. A Revolutionary War museum also depicts the era. Fort Griswold was designated as a state park in 1953. ~ Fort Griswold Battlefield State Park website
Col. Ledyard memorial
There is some doubt about the details of this story. The shirt and vest Col. Ledyard was wearing when he was killed had tears in the side, suggesting a bayonet wound is what caused his death, not his own sword in the hands of a British officer.
parade ground in the fort
dried seed pods on the wall
Critical acumen is exerted in vain to uncover the past; the past cannot be presented; we cannot know what we are not. But one veil hangs over past, present, and future, and it is the province of the historian to find out, not what was, but what is. Where a battle has been fought, you will find nothing but the bones of men and beasts; where a battle is being fought, there are hearts beating. ~ Henry David Thoreau (A Week on the Concord & Merrimack Rivers)
dried seed pods on the wall
a door in the fort wall
looking down at the lower battery, seen from the new viewing platform
USCGC Eagle docked across the Thames River at Fort Trumbull in New London
The 295-foot Barque Eagle is the flagship of the U.S. Coast Guard. She serves as a training vessel for cadets at the Coast Guard Academy and candidates from the Officer Candidate School. The Eagle is the only active-duty sailing vessel in America’s military, and one of only two commissioned sailing vessels, along with the USS Constitution. ~ US Coast Guard Academy website
Tim at entrance to the tunnel through the wall of the fort
Tim at exit of the tunnel through the wall of the fort
From the tunnel we followed a trench down the hill. The trench hid the soldiers from enemy fire as they moved between the fort and the lower battery.
view from the trench
looking down the trench, it turns to the left ahead
after the turn, getting closer to the end
powder magazine, built in 1843
looking up at the fort, the trench zig zags to the right
Off to the side on the lower battery is the restored Ebenezer Avery house. It was moved to this location from a nearby street in 1971.
In the old times, women did not get their lives written, though I don’t doubt many of them were much better worth writing than the men’s. ~ Harriet Beecher Stowe (The Pearl of Orr’s Island: A Story of the Coast of Maine)
Anna Warner Bailey
Sometimes I think that historical houses should be named after the wives and daughters who lived in them, to honor them, as they very likely spent more time working there than the men who were out and about in the world.
But on a plaque outside this house I found a picture of Anna Warner Bailey (1758-1851) and the note that she was one of the first women to tend to the wounded after the battle. When I got home I found this online: Our Petticoat Heroine by Carol Kimball
We’ll have to wait until the pandemic is over before we can tour the house. I discovered a bit of synchronicity, we happened to be visiting this place on the 170th anniversary of Anna Warner “Mother” Bailey’s death. And there is a house named for her close by, where she had lived.
entrance gate and Groton Monument, seen from lower battery
The Groton Monument was built between 1826 and 1830, and is the oldest monument of its type in the country. Built of granite quarried locally, the Monument stands 135 feet tall with 166 steps. ~ Fort Griswold Battlefield website
We will also have to wait until the pandemic is over before we can tour the monument and small museum.
When I was preparing this post I noticed I already had a category for Fort Griswold Battlefield State Park. With another nod to synchronicity, it turns out Tim & I visited the fort nine years ago, almost to the day! The trench looks a little different nine years later. We had climbed up on the fort wall, which is no longer allowed. They have installed a viewing platform on the wall sometime in the past nine years. My, how things keep changing… The views of the river and city below are amazing. My old post: Fort Griswold Battlefield
As we continue to carve out a new life for ourselves in quarantine, we have started referring to “our bubble.” Stay safe, stay home. We are wary of popping our bubble by some careless slip of protocol. We care for our safe zone (our bubble) and speak of it fondly sometimes, as we tend to it like one would a houseplant or a pet.
4.14.20 ~ Elm Grove Cemetery, Mystic, Connecticut
Yesterday we went for an early morning walk at Elm Grove Cemetery in Mystic. It’s a large scenic resting place along the Mystic River, just north of Mystic Seaport. The seaport is closed for the pandemic and many (most?) of its employees have been laid off. We parked at the south end of the graveyard where we could see the dockyard across the water and also explore the fascinating carvings on the gravestones of past sailors.
4.14.20 ~ Mystic Seaport from a distance
4.14.20 ~ sailing poetry on a headstone
4.14.20 ~ Mystic Seaport buildings
We’re going to renew our membership to Mystic Seaport anyway. Even though we have no idea when it will be safe to visit again.
4.14.20 ~ looking across the Mystic River
I’m pretty sure that cliff and house (above) are part of the Peace Sanctuary, where Janet, her mom and I took a lady slippers nature walk back in 2013. See lady slippers.
4.14.20 ~ Draken Harald Hårfagre, still covered for winter
Will the Viking ship have any adventures this year? I have my doubts there will be a Viking Days festival this June…
4.14.20 ~ a soggy stuffed bunny hiding
4.14.20 ~ New London Ledge Lighthouse
4.14.20 ~ one of the cemetery’s peaceful ponds
4.14.20 ~ a lighthouse for a monument
4.14.20 ~ a small decorative well that Tim loved
4.14.20 ~ another peaceful pond
And we finally came around back to our car. Can’t believe it’s six years old! In some places folks aren’t permitted to drive somewhere to take a walk but we are, thankfully. Tim says it isn’t good for cars to sit without running for long periods of time. Our car is an important part of our bubble!
This was our first walk where we did not encounter a single person! Not sure if it was the location or the time of day that did the trick. I suspect there will be more cooler early morning walks as the warmer summer days come along. As long as we can manage to stay safe in our bubble.
We now have 21 confirmed cases of COVID-19 in our town.
