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Happy Year of the Dragon. Here is my Dragon Girl Bird sculpture from 2018.

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Saturday, June 13, 2015

More woods around here

Anyone who is visiting, or lives in this area full time, knows that these Western North Carolina mountains are teeming with woods.  Ah, greenness abounds!


Summertime is upon us, with nice cool nights, some afternoon showers, and humidity that varies from 60 to 90 percent.  Fog is often what I first see in the mornings before that good old sunshine showers my eastern windows.

A mountain road with the sights delineated for travelers

So though there are woods in any direction you might jump, I'll share more of the latest of my day trips with you now.
Joyce Kilmer - Slickrock Wilderness, Nantahala National Forest
Up close and more personal.  The little things you see along a walk.  And I have a trusty camera that didn't run out of battery power for the whole first half of the walk.  And the second half I was so tired already I didn't feel like taking a single picture anyway, almost.


One of the streams which you fortunately get a bridge across




Interesting how the whole first half of the lower loop has been rubbed out...it's not that hard to find!

The trail is well marked, maintained, and has steps added to keep erosion under control

All the felled trees had already died, Hemlocks with an insect that has killed most of them in the forests in this area, and perhaps some chestnuts which died back in the 1920s from Chestnut blight..

With the death of the hemlocks, there is more sunlight filtering to the floor of the woods, so new growth is happening.  The leaves closest to me were Poplars, the children of the biggest trees in this woods already.  Tim remembers walking these trails about 20 years ago, and they were very dark indeed with all the hemlocks.

One of the few examples of wildlife we saw...a few dogs were walking the path as well (on leashes) ahead of us

Today's Poem:

The Fog
by Carl Sandburg

 THE fog comes
on little cat feet.

It sits looking
over harbor and city
on silent haunches
and then moves on.






6 comments:

  1. Barbara -- great photo captures. They are really nice and sharp. Oh, sad about the hemlocks. So many of our trees in this century have had insect manifestations that were deadly. You seem to be walking trails a lot lately. I too with my new dog. She is beginning to calm down as she was a running rascal when I got her from the humane society. Have a good weekend -- barbara

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  2. Super photos, Barb, and I really like the poem!

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  3. We visited Joyce Kilmer almost forty years ago and it was like a religious experience -- I hate seeing the dead and dying hemlocks.

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  4. Linda, I had to go back and look at the picture...yes, I was busy reading words and missed seeing the moss!
    Barb, thanks. What is your dog's name? I just took a lot of pics on one day's adventures...and when I've published them all, I will go out and take more! Enjoy walking your little furry friend.
    Mona, thanks for liking the poem, and the pics!
    Vicki...I had heard that also, but it sure was more like a graveyard, which can be a religious experience of another sort, I guess. The poplars are still beautiful at least.

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  5. It looks like a beautiful part of the country.

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Thanks for your comments...