Finnegan Road In The Town of Lawrence

The dogs and I had just finished a hike on the Rutland Nature Trail, beginning on Finnegan Road. Once I had all the pooches back in the car, I decided that this lovely rural road would make a nice driving tour:

This was more forest than farm fields, a rural road with comfortable, country homes:

There were old houses and new, big houses and small. This rather large home sat far back behind a row of trees and a stone wall:

This old farmstead may have been the home of one of the area's original settlers, maybe even the Finnegans:

Another family farm, with barns out behind the house:

A home with a patio deck and small lighthouse out front:

A large home with an impressive porch and a pond:

A woodsy home, set back in the trees and looking peaceful:

A smaller home:

Older barns alongside a modern home:

A modular and a mobile home:

A log home with an American flag, set back in the woods. There weren't many homes on Finnegan Road, and this was the end of our driving tour. But we'd had our hike and were anxious to get home:

The Rutland Trail At Finigan Road - Part 2

I had all five dogs on the Rutland Nature Trail (see Part 1, yesterday) and we'd almost reached the bridge. I could see it just ahead:

The dogs broke into a run to reach the bridge but I hollered for them to come back to me - and to my surprise, they did:

This well constructed bridge must have formerly held the weight of the railroad trains:

The scene looked a bit magical as we crossed over Trout Brook:

I looked to the north at Trout Brook and could see the massive stone bridge abutments, built many years ago for the railroad:

We continued walking for a while, but soon turned around and began heading back to the car:

Having used up some of their excess energy, the dogs were much less inclined to run ahead on the way back:

They may have been less inclined to run, but they were more inclined to stop and sniff everything:

The Spring Peepers were silent and I concluded that their season was over for the year:

And the scenery was altogether pleasant, with wetlands on both sides of the road:

Fergus often doesn't photograph well, but I captured him this time, apparently deep in thought and looking good:

Fascinating smells everywhere. I saw what looked like coyote poop and wondered if the dogs knew what type of animal they were smelling. When we neared the road and our parked car, I told the dogs to heel. Alas, Jack had no idea what that meant, so I called him back, hooked on his leash and gave him his first lesson:

The Rutland Trail At Finnegan Road - Part 1

Our on-again-off-again springtime was, once again, on. We had a lovely day so I took the dogs back to the Rutland Nature Trail, the site of an old railroad line, for a brief hike. This time, however, we began at Finnegan Road to explore a section we hadn't seen before:

This was a straight, level path which ran through lovely wetlands. The dogs ran and played:

All five dogs were off the leash and full of energy. I was happy to see them having fun, but insisted that they not get too far ahead of me:

We walked through short patches of woods, but always there were open wetlands ahead and behind us. You can see the next wetland coming up in this photo:

Jack, the newest dog (the gold colored one), was just learning to walk off leash. He'd had some difficulty on previous hikes, but this time out, he behaved better than any of the other dogs:

Wildlife had left fascinating smells all along the trail for the dogs to sniff:

I momentarily thought this was a beaver lodge but changed my mind when I noticed it was built of reeds and cattails instead of branches. I decided that it was a muskrat lodge:

The happy dogs ran ahead and then, when I called, ran back to me. They seemed to consider it all great fun:

Big Seamus loves this sort of trail. It's easy for him to lumber along, with few obstacles to climb over. Come to think of it, I like this sort of trail for the same reason:

Our happy little group continued on:

Seamus climbed down the bank for a cool drink:

We could see the bridge just ahead and I knew we'd be there soon. But I'll post about that in Part 2, tomorrow: