I'm Back in the Saddle Again!

Well, metaphorically, anyway. After a hiatus for what turned out to be more than just a simple bacterial conjunctivitis (see this entry), a hiatus that included CONTACT ISOLATION for Pete's sake, we got back out on the trail today. And it felt sooooo good! We had beautiful weather, too.

We debated Wenonah Trails, Parvin State Park, and others. After discovering Parvin is closed because of damage from the recent storms I asked the future trail runner to look at the info I had on Maurice River Bluffs Preserve in Cumberland County. She agreed with me that this looked interesting, and we told the other two of our choice. My only complaint is that the map is not very detailed, but I hoped maybe there would be an updated one at the trail head. There was not, but there was volunteer steward there who knew the trails, including the new yellow they speak of on the link above (which is not the yellow you see in the photo above -- that's the boundaries of the preserve). It was easily accessed off the junction of the red and white trails.



When you enter the preserve, you come almost immediately to the blue trail, and we turned left onto it, headed toward the red trail. If you've read other entries, you know we pinkpuffyheart love well blazed trails, and this fit the bill. Even the little one could find and follow their blazes. At most of the trail junctions we came to there were also directional posts.

So, when they named this "Maurice River Bluffs" I wasn't sure what to think of that, but rest assured, there are enough steep slopes, small gorges, and pretty much the perfect setting for re-enacting The Hunger Games for anyone. Unfortunately, most of the photos I tried to take don't realistically convey the depth. I suppose one of these days I should watch the CD that came with my digicam, or maybe take a class. Ooooh, I think REI offers one.....

So we aren't on the red trail long before we're on a ridge:

Even the tree is holding on!



It turns out that lower area is where you end up next, after a switchback:

All kinds of fun stuff in this preserve! It had recently rained, so there was tons of funky fungi (say THAT 3X fast!). Some of the standard toadstool, bracket fungi, etc. but then there were neon yellow ones, coal black ones, and this little stand that reminded me of enoki mushrooms:

Don't tell my Irish ancestors, but it was my husband who pointed out this is a Faerie Ring

There were also some seriously strange, Area 51-looking trees like these:



Any arborists out there who can tell me what the deal is with these spiky trees???

There were also a few large trees down from the storms last month, like at Parvin. We were able to get around this monster, but someone on a mountain bike would not have been able to:

If you squint you can see a bit of pink and blue in the center there...

This break was approx. 25ft up

Both the white and yellow trails come up along the river, and when we reached the water the girls wanted to dip their tootsies in. I thought it would make a nice break before heading up the yellow trail, so I let them have a bit of time once we moved up away from the folks with the jet skis.

Once they'd had their fill of squishing sand between their toes and trying to identify every.living.organism they could see, we moved on to the yellow trail. I had read the trail had "a 35-foot long bridge, steps and rails throughout the steeper parts" which sounded pretty darned cool to me, so we headed off. We quickly came upon a steep incline and the girls begged to climb up. I stayed down on the trail so I could observe all three at once.

I was *perfectly* positioned, therefore, to see the middle daughter build up more momentum coming down than she could handle, and whoopsie daisy! tumble down head over heels. She was crying right away, in that high pitched "I'm wounded!" way, but she was also flailing all 4 limbs immediately so I held off sending up a flare. She is bruised and has a nasty scratch on her shoulder blade, but she's okay. Once she was calm I took the opportunity to educate all three of them on how to better handle a slide on a trail, mainly by choosing their immediate path wisely, and to get and stay low. The mishap really made her want to head back, so we will save the yellow trail for another day.

On the hike back in, I turned at one point and saw this, and couldn't resist snapping a picture:

And she also spied this little fellow waiting to say goodbye:

If you're ever in the area, you should really check this area out! Look for this sign on Silver Run Road =)...