Illston circular via Burton Overy, Little Stretton, Kings Norton

Led by me, with Maureen and Eddie. Very hot, good underfoot. Same as walk a week ago. About 8 miles.
The same route as last Thursday's walk, but without the unintentional strayings. I won't describe the route in detail here.
If you look at the photo above really really carefully, you may just see the waymarked yellow post among the leaves. This is at grid ref SP691984. To be fair the path is now clear on the ground, as the hay has been harvested. Last Thursday I was distracted by a wide opening in the hedge about 50 yards to the right!



After crossing the minor road close to a cattle grid, we cross a field with cows, and another piece of grassland, then join the minor road again as it goes downhill to Burton Overy. We've cut a corner off by footpath.

These cows had no intention of leaving the shade of the trees - wise beasts.

Burton Overy church lies to the west of the path

We walk through Burton Overy, noting that the Bell is open later. We find the path and take this as far as the footpath to Little Stretton. It's not very clear through the last cornfield.
Little Stretton Church was and is dependent on Kings Norton.
There is a bench in the sun, but in today's heat we decide to shelter in the porch for our break.
Then its through cornfields and pasture to Kings Norton, where we have a peep inside the church.

This is a photograph of an eighteenth century painting of the Fortrey family. William Fortrey was responsible for the rebuilding of Kings Norton Church between 1757 and 1775. For more about the village British History Onlinehas a page with loads of information.This monument was erected by William Fortreyin memory of his parents, William (d. 1722) and Anne (d. 1733).

More tagged cows, with Kings Norton Church on the horizon.

We make our way back past Illston Grange and its horses - who are all thirsty today.We drive by a slightly roundabout route to Burton Overy - a pint of iced lemonade!

Ahhh

Remember all those things we were going to do today? We did all of them except go to see the Mexican free-tailed bats. Tomorrow night is when we anticipate seeing the bats.

After going to the Visitor Center, walking to Upper and Lower McKinney Falls, and going grocery shopping, we were in mellow vacation mode.

McKinney Falls State Park

Upper Falls Swimming Hole

Upper McKinney Falls swimming hole--dry falls.

Upper McKinney Falls swimmin' hole cypress trees.

Visitor Center at the park.

At the Visitor Center, we saw man-made chimney swift towers. Chimney swifts historical natural nests used to be hollow old-growth trees. However, since most old-growth trees were logged years ago, the swifts adapted to man-made structures. The towers are for birds to roost and nest in.

Chimney swift tower.

Short walk to Lower McKinney Falls. Can anyone identify the flowers? The photos aren't very good. The first flower is white with yellow center. The second is like a jack-in-the-pulpit. There's a pod with a very small purple "head" poking out.

Swimmin' hole at Lower McKinney Falls.

We can't wait to go swimming!

Interesting potholes in the rock.

For dinner, I fixed herbed chicken breasts and caramelized red peppers served with coleslaw.

Bob finished reading "The Madoff Chronicles," by Brian Ross which he enjoyed. (Thank you Mona Liza of The Lowe's Travel Adventures!) I've been catching up on blogs because I'm way behind reading them.

After
Bob finished the book, we started a campfire so we could make s'mores.
It has been a very long time since we've had a campfire. The s'mores
were yummy. When we finished those, I also had a turkey hot dog because I
really wanted a campfire-cooked hot dog. So tasty.

The campfire and our new roasting sticks.

On the right, a s'more waiting to be eaten.

Just a gooey, melted marshmallow.

We sat outside by the fire and talked for a bit before heading inside for the night. The moon is so bright we can see our shadows! And we never did receive more rain this evening. The storms must have parted and gone around the campground.

Enjoy the rest of your weekend.

Safe travels from Travel Bug and Bob. Over and out.

D&SNGRR

So, what did I do today? I rode the Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad.
It was a beautiful day to take a railroad ride. The D&SNGRR provided some awesome scenery. The trip took basically the whole day (3 1/2 hours+ each way, lunch at Silverton). In Silverton, I had lunch at the Shady Lady Saloon - an original brothel/saloon.
Back at the motel, the laptop was busy processing some 300 photos I took today.
I was not sure about spending $71 and all day to ride the train. It was worth it. With the nice weather, I rode in an open gondola car. Seats facing out. Recommendation - if you can, reserve a corner seat in the gondola (1, 24, 25, 48). That give you easy access to the aisle (and the other side of the car).
Here, our train, powered by locomotive #482, negotiates the "High Line". That's the Animas River below.

Journey to Indian Valley Open Space...

Sammie here - I LOVE this place and wanted to bring Avalon to see it, cause I only get to go here after a big rain! There's a creek here that fills up then and I knew we'd have a pawesome time! The adventure began the moment we got out of the Sammie-mobile - a big, huge horse/doggeh clip-clopped by and it was suure interesting!

The moment we passed by the gate, Avalon found a stick and lay down in the creek to gnaw on it for a bit!
Then she got up all alert from her stickie reveries and checked out the scene!
I was watchin' closely, fur I had so much more to show her! She just loved that stickie!
A cool bridge! I showed her what was up the trail a bit and then we crossed back over it to Mom and Dad.
Then a ways up the road, we found a cool trail that wound up and up through a thick forest, where we ran and ran.
We finally got to a beautiful meadow, where we just had to take some time to have some pawesome zoomies!
Wild Zoomies! Bitey face zoomies!
Then, all of a sudden, we heard some sounds we knew we should investigate...
Sure enough... some cuzzies... maybe! We hung out with them for a while and had lots of fun in the creek!
The sun began to go down and we headed back for the car. What a bootiful day on Indian Valley Trail!
Thanks for all your wonderful comments about Ozzie! She continues to do wonderfully well and as mentioned in our last post, gets her stitches out Tuesday morning!

Pond Life

As we were digging in the vegetable garden I heard a great creaking noise in the sky - I looked up and saw two swans flying in the direction of the pond.





They seemed very calm, quite at home. I hope they stay.

Playing with PhotoShop

I have been in the hospital since Tuesday. Nothing major - biopsy and colonoscopy. Just that being on coumadin, it take 2+ days in the hospital before and procedures and 3+ after.
Anyway - so I have been playing with the filter effects with PhotoShop and Microsoft Picture It! Really like the glowing edges filter.
Downloaded filters from Filter Forge and The Plugin Site. Its amazing the artistic effects with PhotoShop filters.
I was able to get the hospital to bring a stationary bike into my room. Been getting some time on the bike - just not like riding outside. Still have to finish my Christmas cards. Other projects had with me in the room - so lots of stuff to do. But really want to be back home. Hopefully tomorrow.

Delays and Boredom

It's doing this today. And it rained all yesterday too. With wind - some. We were supposed to leave to start our grand adventure this morning but... and it's not only da rain. Stayed tuned...
So. We've been very bored. Mom didn't catch our pawesome work last night on candid cam, but we're posting some recycled octopus destruffing activity from a ways back. We did a good job then, and we did a great job on a duck last night.
Don't look at me - check out the great Sammers.
So whattya think? Great job, eh?
We are a great team when faced with boredom! (And it looks like several more days of rain too, not that we don't like waters - we do!)
The other problem that's causing our delay is that the transmission on our towing truck is being replaced - owwwwooooooooooh. We are all hoping to depart by Sunday, but we'll keep you posted!

Hugs xoxoxo