Water Loving Dogs At Whippoorwill Corners - Part 2

The dogs and I were hiking the trail along Plumb Brook in the Whippoorwill Corners State Forest (see also Part 1, posted yesterday):

And since it was a hot day, the dogs were even more anxious to go into the water than usual:

I'd let them cool off, then we'd continue on our way through the forest, with Plumb Brook always on our right:

Seamus led us through a number of patches of giant False Hellebore, a member of the Lily family which I've read can grow up to eight feet tall (four feet tall is the biggest I've seen):

Always staying beside the brook, the trail took us through a ferny woods:

Seamus sometimes wandered too far ahead and I had to call him back. Being old and tired, he hates to retrace his steps, but if he goes too far ahead of us, I insist on it:

I kept seeing these plants with the oddly shaped leaves and remembered learning what they were back in college. I thought they were called Lion something, so I looked it up when I got home. Indeed, they are Lion's-Foot, a member of the Composite (Daisy) family:

We continued on through the cool woods, watching for more easy places to access the brook:

Fergus found a place to get into the cool water!

And soon all the dogs were enjoying the brook (Jack was there too, somewhere):


Hey, there's Jack! I sat down on the river bank to rest, and Jack came up behind me to see what I was doing:


I was thinking that it must be about time for us to turn around and head back to the car, but the beauty of the scenery kept calling us forward. I'll post Part 3 tomorrow:

Chapter 2 - Southville State Forest

I'd taken the dogs hiking in the Southville State Forest, not too far from the farm. We'd hiked downhill until we reached the St. Regis River. Seamus knew exactly what to do with that river:

And he seemed to enjoy gazing at the scenery also:

My sister called my cell phone (who knew one could take a phone call in such a remote, wild location?) and I sat on a rock at the water's edge, holding the phone in my left hand and snapping photos with my right:

Clover and Madeline explored the shoreline:

Who, me? I'm not going into that water!:

False Hellebore, Veratrum viride, was springing up all along the edge of the water:

And fiddleheads, of course - thousands upon thousands of them:

We began walking back upstream:

Seamus led the way while the other dogs sniffed here, there and everywhere:

I was at the back of the pack, stepping carefully to protect my injured ankles:

But all in all, it was a gloriously spectacular day at a wonderful, beautiful, natural spot:

When we arrived back at the lane which we'd walked to get to the river, Madeline decided to go down to the river one last time. I thought for a second she might consider getting her feet wet, but apparently the very thought of it was too much and she scurried back uphill to get away from it. But we had more hiking yet to do, and I'll post about that tomorrow: