The Leonard Pond Trail - Part 2

The dogs and I were hiking the Leonard Pond trail but not having much success in finding the spur trail which would take us to Leonard Pond (see also yesterday's post). No matter, the forest was magnificent and the dogs were happy:

This brilliant spot of orange caught my attention and I believe it was a slime mold:

We never did find the spur trail to Leonard Pond and my injured ankles were getting painful, so we turned around and began heading back toward the car:

Back through the variety of forest types:

Fergus seemed even more playful than usual and poked his head out of the ferns, trying to get me to play. Alas, I've gotten too old and decrepit for very much playing. But I did give him a friendly word or two for his effort:

When we got to this amazing, undulating, emerald carpet of moss, I positioned the dogs together for a "family portrait." They had worn themselves out sufficiently at that point to hold still, at least briefly:

Back through the forest of Red Pines:

In some places, things looked magical. Even the dogs seemed to sense it:

The dogs had slowed down enough to stop and investigate every smell, making small side trips into the forest and then back out onto the trail:

After a while, the dogs could tell that we were getting close to the car and picked up their speed:

Returning to the car always seems to be as exciting for the dogs as getting out of the car to embark on a new hike. I guess dogs are just happy to out and doing something with their family:

Once everybody was back in the car, we drove back out to the highway and began the journey home:

The Leonard Pond Trail - Part 1

The access road to the Leonard Pond trail was directly across the road from the access road to Jamestown Falls (yesterday's post). But this time, we had to park at the trail head and hike - which was just fine with my joyful dogs:

We began in a coniferous forest, a boreal forest type, filled with the wonderful aroma of Balsam Firs:

The forest type kept changing as we walked, in this place a hardwood forest, but with pines and spruce just ahead:

I stopped to admire and photograph this wonderful ferny moss growing on a fallen log. Notice the Pixie-Cup Lichen at the top center, just below and to the left of those red spots:

The trail was lovely and easy walking:

We walked through a Red Pine forest:

I later read that the Red Pines had taken over after the forest fires of the early 1900s:

A variety of lichens on a pine branch:

We saw this green oasis just off the trail and stopped to investigate. It was a designated campsite, and a beautiful one at that:

There was supposed to be a spur trail which would lead us to Leonard Pond but there were a number of such trails and I had left my trail guide back at the car. Oops. We kept trying branching paths and then returning to the main trail:

I finally decided that we'd gone beyond where the Leonard Pond spur was supposed to branch off, so we just took the next one we came to:

And it was a beauty. Pond or no pond, this was a lovely forest and we were exploring. I'll post Part 2 tomorrow: