Follow the falcon...

...or the hawk or...some big bird. My children really like the Ninjago: Masters of Spinjitzu show on Cartoon Network. In some of the episodes, one of the characters sees a mysterious falcon and feels a connection with it. He follows it and it leads him to important discoveries. I felt like that character the other day on my walk at lunch. I happened to see what looked like a hawk or other large bird through the trees going after something on the ground. As you can see from the picture here, I didn't get a good look at it and only got this one out-of-focus picture of it (you can barely see it circled in red in the picture). But I wanted to find out more about it and to get a good picture.

As I tried to get closer, I stepped off the path and into the woods. I made a lot of noise as I pushed through the bushes, though, and the bird kept flying further into the woods. I was getting deeper into the woods and thought about turning back to the path. As I made one more push to get close enough for a picture, I saw a path that I had never seen before. The picture on the left shows the path (it's very hard to see in this picture - trust me - it was pretty obvious). I've been walking these woods for years and never saw this. The bird flew off while I was still thinking about whether I should follow the path or not. I finally decided it was worth exploring and headed off.

I'm not a great explorer but it was a thrill to see this new path. I imagined all the places it might go. Best of all, I hoped it would take me closer to places the birds and other wildlife hid. As I said in this post, I have been disappointed that the old path was widened to create a fire break a couple of years ago. The last picture on the right shows that widened path. When you're not as close to the trees, you're not as close to the birds that like to perch and/or hide in the trees. I hoped this new path would reveal a new world of creatures.

The new path cut through the woods. After a while, it came around to parallel the main path but then I ran into another new path that headed off into the heart of the woods. It swung around low areas where pools collect in heavy rains and where amazingly colorful trees grow because of the better water supply. Unfortunately, because the path was little used, the bushes and weeds brushed against me and I sounded like an elephant striding through the bush. This scared away all the birds I was hoping to see. That just means I should walk here more often to wear a good path - but not too wide. After a while, I realized I'd better be getting back to work and back-tracked to my starting place.

Later that day, I found I hadn't scared away all the wildlife. Ticks had found me and were probably as excited about my finding the path as I was. I ended up spending as much time getting rid of them as I had on the path. So, I think I'll wait until a deep frost kills them before I head back there. But it's exciting to think about it. I'll be looking forward to my walks at lunch even more.