Woodswoman Extraordinaire

I have always, always had a major thing for woolly bear caterpillars, a.k.a. Isabella Tiger Moth larvae, or Pyrrharctia isabella. I simply adore them. I kept them as "pets" as a kid, and distinctly recall holding a funeral for one that didn't quite survive to mothdom. Here's me with one of my woolly bear buddies long ago:

I also clearly recall an autumn hike in which I toodled along after my parents and older sister, scooping up every woolly bear I could find and dropping it into the hood of my jacket. I had them everywhere by the end of that walk - dozens of them.

Even now, every fall I spend most of my hikes subconsciously scanning for them in hopes of being able to spend a few minutes with one bumping over my knuckles. I drive around in fear of squishing one, and in fact am still traumatized by the memory of one fabulous and horrible autumn that produced an incredible crop of woolly bears such that it was impossible to avoid squishing them by the dozens while driving.

I'm not sure why I find them so appealing, but I do. They seem like gentle little creatures, with such lovely fuzzy stripes. I remember being so disappointed to learn that the adult moths are a drab brown color. Folklore has it that you can predict how harsh the upcoming winter will be by the width of the rust-colored stripe: wide stripe = mild winter, narrow stripe = better make sure the snow shovel is in good working order and you have plenty of stacked wood.

Has this been an acceptable autumn? Why yes, it has. This fine specimen allowed me a few minutes of joy at Taughannock Falls:

Aaaawwwww.

Following our Farmers' Market excursion in Ithaca, we decided to take advantage of some of the wonderful places around the area for a walk. The Ithaca area is full of gorges, created long ago by glaciers. Many of the gorges have parks and hiking trails. Hence, the most classic of all Ithaca bumper stickers:

Very punny.

We selected one of our old autumn favorites: Taughannock State Park, off route 89 just outside of Ithaca.

Most people seem to walk the Taughannock Falls gorge trail, right up the bottom of the gorge and to the base of a picturesque water fall that is actually higher than Niagara Falls (but with a lot less water). While that is a lovely walk, it's short, and we tend to prefer a little more solitude for our woodland wanderings. Instead, we usually walk the rim trails - this time the South Rim.

It was a perfectly lovely autumn day, although deceptively brisk. The hounds, of course, thought it was a great romp. Well, Lucy did, anyway. I think Simon did not much relish certain parts of the experience.

You can't see them well in this picture, but can you spot the group of people on the trail ahead of Spouse and hounds? It just so happened that the SUNY Cortland women's hockey team was engaged in a team-building scavenger hunt along the upper trails as well. So, we repeatedly ran into groups of 5 or 6 young women at a time, who squealed with delight over our pair of goofy, wrinkly, droopy basset hounds. Lucy's response to attention is to to try to slurp and climb inside the skin of every person who will pay attention to her. She just eats it right up.

Poor Simon. This is generally how he feels about strangers:

Our kids were rescues from the local Humane Association shelter, and given how skittish and hand shy they were we assume they were abused before Spouse and I adopted them. Lucy has recovered just fine, but my sweet Slimy just tries to hide from strangers. Poor kid. He spent parts of the walk wishing Spouse's and my legs were larger and better for hiding behind.

It was no Adirondack High Peak and wasn't much of a workout, but it was incredibly beautiful and nice to get outside. I'll leave you with one of my more favorite shots of the day. No idea who created him, but I suspect he may have been one of the objects to be found in the scavenger hunt: