Yesterday evening, after spending most of the day in bed with a tension headache (stress + dehydration + change in weather), I went over to the Stony Brook nature preserve to try to take some pictures.  Sort of oddly, the only ones that came out at all were all shades of blue.  First, this odd mystery plant:

There were also these berries – I have no idea what they are either:

And then, this lonely feather along the path:

Happily I felt much better today, and it was so beautiful outside that I decided a hike was necessary.  It’s been awhile since I hiked “all by myselps”, as my nephew used to say, and none of my old usual haunts really felt like they would be enough of a challenge. I moseyed over to the Trustees of Reservations website and decided to visit Noon Hill Reservation, which is a short drive from where I live.

The good news was, it was exactly what I was looking for.  The summit trail is only 1.3 miles and fairly easy, with only a couple of challenging spots that I got through just fine, thank you very much.  (I’m not ready for another go at Monadnock, but I am improving.)  It was also well traveled, with lots of people and dogs, so I felt perfectly safe.  It’s a pretty place, but much more a place of exercise than a place of photography – which, frankly, with the trouble I’ve been having with my camera is just as well.

Amusingly, the view at the top includes this:

It took me a minute to realize that the aliens had not finally arrived, and that I was looking over towards Foxboro – that’s Gillette Stadium in the fuzzy distance.

I also meandered around the pond loop trail, which was really buggy; I’d leave that for another time of year when the mosquitos aren’t so bad.  At this point I was getting a little tired, but I wasn’t ready to go home just yet.  About a five minute drive from Noon Hill is another Trustees property called Cedariver, and so I stopped there for a bit.  It is a lovely place for a short walk, provided that you mind where you step.  The neighbors have horses and there were several places where the trail was poo-bombed.  However, I found what might be my new favorite tree, an enormous old oak.  It was so big that I couldn’t get a good shot of all of it, but here’s a bit:

I know those vines aren’t good for the tree, but they were quite lovely to look at.

The other thing I found along the path was this little cairn.  It’s a 1-mile loop trail with no summit, so I’m not sure why it’s there.  However, there’s a Sikh ashram not far from this trail, where they offer some lovely yoga classes, and I wondered if someone from the ashram built it. Although, as I type this now it occurs to me that for all I know someone buried their dead dog there, but whatever, it made for a peaceful little spot:

Tomorrow:  adventures of a different sort.  Time to get out the crock pot!