Fall Blooms at Cumberland River

It is surprising that there are wild flowers still blooming this late in the fall.  Still feels like summer.

Caney Fork-Flowers Along the River Bank



The photos were taken along the banks of the Caney Fork River where it merges with the Cumberland River in Smith, Tennessee.

Old Stage Coach Behavior Rules - A Long Walk back

Old stage coach in Mosinee, Wisconsin.  Passengers crowded into coaches caused conditions that prompted Wells Fargo to post these rules in each coach for passenger behavior:

• Abstinence from liquor is requested, but if you must drink share the bottle. To do otherwise makes you appear selfish and unneighborly.
• If ladies are present, gentlemen are urged to forego smoking cigars and pipes as the odor of same is repugnant to the gentler sex. Chewing tobacco is permitted, but spit with the wind, not against it.
• Gentlemen must refrain from the use of rough language in the presence of ladies and children.
• Buffalo robes are provided for your comfort in cold weather. Hogging robes will not be tolerated and the offender will be made to ride with the driver.
• Don't snore loudly while sleeping or use your fellow passenger's shoulder for a pillow; he or she may not understand and friction may result.
• Firearms may be kept on your person for use in emergencies. Do not fire them for pleasure or shoot at wild animals as the sound riles the horses.
• In the event of runaway horses remain calm. Leaping from the coach in panic will leave you injured, at the mercy of the elements, hostile Indians and hungry coyotes.
• Forbidden topics of conversation are: stagecoach robberies and Indian uprisings.
• Gents guilty of unchivalrous behavior toward lady passengers will be put off the stage. It's a long walk back. A word to the wise is sufficient.

Island of Wagon Wheels & Horse Pulled Carriages

 

Mackinac Island is a very unique place to visit if you want to get away from cars and motor vehicles and traffic noise.  If you want to see what it is like using horse and buggies for traveling around town, then this is the place to visit.  Everything and everyone is transported by horses, carriages, and wagons including the trash pickup and taxi services. Of course you can always walk or ride bikes. The streets can smell from all the horse traffic so clean up after the horses is also important. I cannot even imagine what the stench was like in a large city like New York or London in horse and carriage days.

PL Fallin Butterfly Wings Gallery

A gallery of some of my favorite butterfly wings from this summer.  I lament that summer is gone and so are these precious butterflies.  Hopefully, I captured their beauty and they will live on through these images.  Life is so short.

Raining Like Ducks

 

 It has been raining like ducks today.  Normally, the saying is cats and dogs but here in Florida we have a lot of ducks and other bird so "Raining like ducks" fits better.  These ducks are enduring the rain and walking around patiently waiting for the rain to stop so they can go back into the pond.  I never paid much attention to the habits of ducks when it rains but on my drive to get a Latte, I noticed all the ducks were out of the pond so I stopped to observe and take pictures.  Of course, I got soaking wet doing it.  I felt like a "duck out of water."

Chasing a Dancing Swallowtail

Walking in the woods I am always searching for the uniqueness and beauty of the surroundings.  This Swallowtail butterfly was dancing from one flower to the next.  I tried to get as many close up shots as I could but his wings were fluttering so fast it was hard for me to catch him for a still life.

Summer Days are Gone as the Faded Flower

 Where have all the flowers gone?  Summer flowers in the woods at Mio, Michigan are now withered.  Summer days are now gone as the faded flower "and all its budded charm."  Reminds me of English Romantic poet John Keats who compared departure at the end of day from his love as a faded flower.

"The day is gone, and all its sweets are gone!"

The day is gone, and all its sweets are gone!
 Sweet voice, sweet lips, soft hand, and softer breast,
Warm breath, light whisper, tender semi-tone,
Bright eyes, accomplish’d shape, and lang’rous waist!
Faded the flower and all its budded charms,
Faded the sight of beauty from my eyes,
Faded the shape of beauty from my arms,
Faded the voice, warmth, whiteness, paradise –
Vanish’d unseasonably at shut of eve,
When the dusk holiday – or holinight
Of fragrant-curtain’d love begins to weave
The woof of darkness thick, for hid delight,
But, as I’ve read love’s missal through to-day,
He’ll let me sleep, seeing I fast and pray. 

By John Keats 1795–1821 

Mother Turtle Took a Stroll

On a afternoon walk, I encountered another walker at the park, a very large turtle heading into the brush.  She definitely stopped traffic when she walked across the parking lot.

Storm and Sunlight at the Marsh

The Marsh at Matanzas Inlet has storm clouds brewing overhead but in the east is a blue sky and bright sunlight.  This is so typical in this sub-tropical region.  Rain and sunlight can be brother and sister playing games on us poor creatures stuck on the earth's floor.

Old Pioneer Covered Wagon Escaped the Fires

We drove around Pikes Peak and looked at the fires that had destroyed 1,000s of acres on the mountains around Colorado Springs.  One block away, the trees were destroyed but the fire did not reach this covered wagon. A symbol of hope and a new life for the pioneers of yester-year and today!

Blue on Blue for a Rainy Day at the River

Took a walk on Shore Drive and it started raining.  The Matanzas River is beautiful in the rain. It makes up for not having trees with the brilliant color leaves of fall.  Different shades of blue you can't find in the mountains so it not so bad here.  Blue on Blue for a rainy day.  "River in the Rain, Sometimes at night you look like a long white train, winding your way away somewhere, River I love you. don't you care" (Roger Miller).

'The Road Not Taken' by Robert Frost

 

The Road Not Taken

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim
Because it was grassy and wanted wear,
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I marked the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I,
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

By Robert Frost

'Fall, Leaves, fall' by Emily Jane Bronte`

'Fall, leaves, fall'

Fall, leaves, fall; die, flowers, away;
Lengthen night and shorten day;
Every leaf sparks bliss to me
Fluttering from the autumn tree.

I shall smile when wreaths of snow
Blossom where the rose should grow;
I shall sing when night's decay
Ushers in a drearier day.

By Emily Jane Bronte

"The Mountain" - Excerpts of Poem by Robert Frost

"The mountain held the town as in a shadow

I saw so much before I slept there once:
I noticed that I missed stars in the west,
Where its black body cut into the sky.
Near me it seemed: I felt it like a wall
Behind which I was sheltered from a wind.
And yet between the town and it I found,
When I walked forth at dawn to see new things,
Were fields, a river, and beyond, more fields.
The river at the time was fallen away,
And made a widespread brawl on cobble-stones;
But the signs showed what it had done in spring;
Good grass-land gullied out, and in the grass
Ridges of sand, and driftwood stripped of bark."

By Robert Frost "The Mountain"



Moose Traffic Jams Are the Best!

At Columbine Lake, there was plenty of wildlife that would walk up to the cabins.  Particularly, moose, bears, and birds of all kinds.  Every morning there would be a traffic jam of cars stopped for Moose to cross the road.  I really like that kind of traffic jam.

Beauty in the Soul of a Haggard Tree

This image struck a chord with me about survival.  The harsh winter storms, snow, rain and winds have torn off this tree's top and branches.  All that is left standing is a torn and haggard trunk.  The roots are still intact receiving some nourishment and up the side is a beautiful rustic aura of reddish-gold bark. There is beauty in the soul of the remains of this tree and if you look closer, you will see she is as vibrant as the meadows that surround her.  It as if she is saying to hikers that past her by: " Even through hash winter snows, I'm still standing here in this wilderness, alone but surviving .  Respect me as you walk-by and may you have the perseverance, strenght, courage, and fortitude to endure hardships that come your way.  Remember me."

Foilage of Splendor at Rib Mountain

Where are the changing leaves of brilliant color and fall foliage?  Certainly not in Florida!  Lucky people of Rib Mountain are enjoying a beautiful array of changing colorings this fall.  A little history of Rib Mountain:  Many of the first people that lived on Rib Mountain were German. When the first settlers came, Rib Mountain was isolated from Wausau by the Wisconsin and Rib Rivers. Cow paths, wagon trails, and logging roads were the first roads in the township. Logging, mining, and farming were common activities early in the township's history.  Why did they name the mountain "Rib"? 

SOME MYTHS

Some people think Rib Mountain is an extinct volcano. as one approaches from the west or east along Highway 29, the cross section of the "rib" does indeed make the mountain appear to have the conical shape of a volcano.  Then again, some people believe Rib Mountain to be volcanic. They see the semi-circle of  three hills and believe that altogether they represent the fragmented remains of the base of a large volcanic mountain.  the Rib section is why it is called "Rib" Mountain.

"A Swinging Bridge" Over the Ravine

 

Unfortunately, there was nothing on the other side to make crossing this bridge exciting.  The creek was dried, no exotic plants or flowers; no visible wildlife, just drizzly rain drops and wetness and over grown vines that were starting to cover the rails.  If not maintained, there will not be an opportunity in the near future to walk across an old Floridian rustic swinging bridge at this park. 

Summerland Pastoral Fields - John Milton's "Lycidas"

 

  few photos of Summerland Park on the North Inlet Trail to Cascade Falls; I particular like seeing the horses grazing in the pasture. I don't have the language skills to write a pastoral elegy like John Milton.

I never hear anything about the work of the poet "John Milton" except in a University English classroom.  His writing style is of a highly educated man and far more sophisticated and elegant then writers today. He had a command of the English language and knew how to use words like a painter uses brush strokes to produce a brilliant effect.  Lycidas is a pastoral elegy which is why I thought about John Milton with the pastoral scene at Summerland Park.

Several verses from John Milton's "Lycidas" to stir the imagination:

"Thee Shepherd, thee the Woods, and desert Caves,
With wilde Thyme and the gadding Vine o'regrown,
And all their echoes mourn.
The Willows, and the Hazle Copses green,
Shall now no more be seen,
Fanning their joyous Leaves to thy soft layes.
As killing as the Canker to the Rose,
Or Taint-worm to the weanling Herds that graze,
Or Frost to Flowers, that their gay wardrop wear,
When first the White thorn blows;
Such, Lycidas, thy loss to Shepherds ear."

John Milton (Bewails a  friend, who drowned in his Passage
from Chester on the Irish Seas, 1637.)

A Wetland at Ravine Gardens

 

Ravine Gardens has detoriated over the years; it has become over grown but there was some opportunities for taking picturs of natural habitation.  It was raining and the ground was getting soaked. The ground was soddy in some places like a wetland.

Chipmuck to the Squirrel "Don't eat that Mushroom!"

I learn something new about friendly trail critters while hiking in the Rocky Mountains.  I saw a squirrel eating a white mushroom.  I just thought that was unusual but I guess acorns are hard to find when there are more pine trees than hardwood trees so edible mushrooms it is.  This squirrel had a large mushroom to carry.  I don't know how he will store it up for the winter.  Mushrooms rot once they are pulled. Chipmucks like candied dry fruit from trail mixes.  That also surprised me.

A Hill Walker's Soulful Spirit

 

Hillwalking is the outdoor activity I prefer.  Unfortunately, I live in Florida where there are no mountains and I have to travel 7-8 hour drive to get to the nearest one.  It is deep in  my soul to be a hill walker since I am of Cherokee Indian descendants.  My ancestors lived in the Smoky Mountains of North Carolina.  When I walk the trails, I can feel 10,000 years of ancestral spirits stirring within my soul.  It is where I belong.

A Poet's Eye In the Lonely Sky

A Poet's Eye In the Lonely Sky

Sea Gull, 
soaring so high
no one inspires
wings of dreams
like you create 
painting the sky.

Clouds descend,

forming a haven
in the twilight;
the tips of your wings
catches the wind,
in poetic flight.

Searching for dreams,
in drifting tide;
Spreading your wings
in glimmering light;
A Poet's eye
In the lonely Sky.

By PL Fallin

"Yond Cassius Has a Lean and Hungry Look"

"Let me have men about me that are fat,
Sleek-headed men and such as sleep a-nights.
Yond Cassius has a lean and hungry look,
He thinks too much; such men are dangerous."
Julius Caesar Act 1, scene 2, 190–195

Little Blue Crab, Why are you Climbing up that Tree?

Little Blue Crab, Why are you Climbing up that Tree?

Little Blue Crab,
Go back to the sea,
You are not a bird,
You do not belong in a tree,
Your eyes look so sad,
Did the tide wash you ashore?
You're in the marsh,
Hiding under the moss,
Why are you climbing up that tree?
I'm not going to touch,
Your claws are too sharp,
They're ready to snap,
Poor little fellow,
The sea is not up that tree!

By PL Fallin

Eating like an Mountaineer - Maggie Valley

It was a lonesome drive down the mountain roads to Maggie Valley.  One lone restaurant was opened with no cars in sight.  The food was very good and the rustic environment made it a very pleasant experience.  It over looked Sheepback Mountain and Soco Gap.  Come back ya"ll, you hear!  We will!