Degrasse State Forest - Part 1

We'd never been to Degrasse State Forest before, so one morning the dogs and I drove there, about 40 miles southwest of home. I found a place to park off the rough dirt road and opened my car door, only to discover a large Viper's Bugloss plant in full bloom. It was prickly and I had to step over it to get out of the car:

We hit the trail immediately. It was smooth enough to drive on - possibly better than the road we came in on, but we were there to hike, not drive:

The dogs were, as always, beside themselves with joy and kept trying to run ahead. That meant that I spent the first half of the hike calling them back:

We passed through a mixed forest of conifers and hardwoods, with so much underbrush that I never attempted leaving the trail. The dogs pretty much stayed on the trail also:

 I thought this was Spotted Knapweed, but it was too big. So I looked it up when I got home and decided that it was Black Knapweed:

It was a pleasant hike and we arrived before it got too hot, which is part of why it was so pleasant:

  I stopped at a patch of Wild Ginger. This plant blooms in the early spring so I've never seen its odd, brown flowers. This year I thought of it when the time was right but didn't want to hike in the chilly, muddy weather. Maybe some day I'll actually do it and get to photograph the flowers:

We took a side trail which I knew from the map would lead to an oxbow, a loop of the Grasse River which had become disconnected from the river and now exists as a sort of long, skinny, looping pond. The dogs saw the water below them and broke into a run:

The bottom was smooth and the water cool, so the dogs enjoyed it immensely. They've had a lot of water to play in this year and have come to regard it as a wonderful thing. Only Clover shies away sometimes:

Seamus immersed himself while Daphne and Fergus waded along the shore, where Jack had already gone back to so he could roll for joy:

The sun reflected off the water as the dogs lingered there:

I took a photo of the Oxbow, looking south. It looks just like a river, which it once was before it became disconnected. It sure was lovely. I'll post Part 2 tomorrow: