hikes – The Hermits' Rest

I’m not kidding. If I lived on one of these Texas Hill Country Rivers like the Blanco, you’d find me every day sitting under a huge bald cypress tree looking at the river life, marveling at the life within the moving water.

I spent a great deal of time this morning just watching fish being fish. It makes me miss my aquariums.

Look at these bluegill beside a cypress.

The morning was magical in many ways, from the light shining on grasses to meeting some interesting Master Naturalists and birders. That’s one reason I love visiting state parks! It’s so much. Fun to talk about what birds and plants we have on our land.

I did find birds farther down the pump house trail, where my binoculars let me enjoy the crown of a Ruby-crowned Kinglet, who also sang his entire repertoire for me.

I also managed to find some palafox and skeleton flowers, which was a pleasant pink surprise.

After that walk, I uploaded everything to iNaturalist until I was invited to lead a nature walk by some fellow campers. We went on the trail that goes under the highway, and I showed them the things I found yesterday as well as finding new plants and a Greylag Goose.

Later in the day I practiced taking pictures with Lee’s newest camera, once I got some help with the settings. Another reason it’s nice to see old friends again. I’d share photos, but they aren’t showing up for me.

I also have no photos of the enjoyable potluck dinner this evening. I got to meet some very interesting newer members and their fun kids and dogs, and enjoyed catching up with others. I’m glad I was able to be more social and really get into some meaningful exchanges.

I’m really going to hate to leave tomorrow, but since the temperatures are going to drop I will need to go bring in some plants. I’ll miss the fish, though.

One of the things you’re supposed to do as a Texas Master Naturalist is share what you know about nature with others. I’m not very good at staffing booths, I’ve discovered, but today I was able to do some nature interpretation with some Cub Scouts, and that’s what I hope to be able to do more of.

You may remember I went with friends to check out the Ranchería Grande as a potential nature walk site. The Cub Scouts leader decided it might be too much for the pack members and some parents, so instead they planned a shorter walk at the Chalk Ridge Falls Park in Belton, and asked me to come along and see what I could show them. She figured it would be pretty simple, given the young people’s attention spans.

Happily, that wasn’t true at all. The park, which winds along the banks of the Lampassas River on the other side of the dam that creates Stillhouse Hollow Lake. It has nice wide trails, though one has to watch out for the many steep ledges some young people want to lean over. There are plenty of birds, trees, flowers, raccoon poop, and weird things to entertain Scouts and their siblings.

I’m explaining what an oak gall is. Can you tell it was chilly?

It was great that most of the participants were interested in the things they saw and found. I enjoyed answering some really good questions and showing everyone lovely sights like buckeye trees, which I didn’t even know we had.

It’s an Ohio buckeye, all right. One youngster observed that it looks like honey.

One little boy asked me a series of questions about what I showed him, was thrilled when I showed him how trees bloom, and after a while, came running up to me with a huge grin and shining eyes, exclaiming, “I love nature now!”

His brother carried a catkin from some tree around for a long time telling everyone how important pollen is. He’d never seen it before.

And the sister of one of the Scouts got all disappointed when her parents said they had to go back to their car. She told them she wanted to stay and keep having this adventure. Wow. I’d say the outing was a success.

And the adults were also great. One grandmother was using her cane to help walk, and had said she’d just stay on the trail when everyone went down some stairs. But she got so interested in what we were seeing that she came on down and made it much further. Afterward, she was so proud of herself and declared she was ready to do some squats. That was just the best.

I had good conversations with the adults as well. One mother said she wished we could come back without the kids so we could go further. I liked her!

Everyone thought that narrowleaf puccoon is a weird name for a plant.

I learned a bunch, too, like that there are chalk deposits in the area and that canyon wrens have a distinctive call I’ll never miss again. They are my Daily Bird. No wonder we found them here—they live on cliffs. We’re at the eastern edge of this bird’s range.

The park has more litter than I’d like to see. We talked about returning with trash bags. Some of the infrastructure is in poor shape, too. But it’s beautiful, free, and just an hour from Cameron. It’s a great field trip, and I’m glad my friend brought the pack there!