Connor and I went for what amounted to a conditioning hike up Indian River valley. Motivated in part by an odd club fungus my brother had noticed on our earlier trip, but short on time, we managed to made it to the upper end of the long muskeg and back to the trailhead in under three hours. We could have made it faster if it hadn’t taken a while to find the fungus and then we got distracted by other things. The approach reminded me of how I used to hike more often (before I went with kids most of the time and/or got distracted by too many different things to keep up a good pace). It was actually nice to get up the valley in a hurry, have some time to look around, and then get back in a timely fashion all without feeling like I was going to burst a lung along the way. It feels good to feel stronger and capable of such outings (it seems like it’s been a while). Connor was able to keep up fairly well, though on the way back he was getting tired.
Several of the things I found of particular interest I photographed, and will probably write separate posts on in the coming days (or maybe months, given how things have gone with other intended posts). Non-photographed items I made note of included a green leafhopper or two I wasn’t able to capture, a spider that walked on water (not new to me) and then went down into the water with its own air bubble (which I’ve heard of, but had not seen here before). Also, a Red-tailed Hawk was calling regularly again during the latter part of our time up in the muskegs (presumably the same one as on Monday?).
