Love song to Lake Katharine

I really can't find the words to describe how much I love hiking at Lake Katharine State Nature Preserve, even on a day like today when there's nothing blooming, the trails are muddy, and tiny bugs keep trying to fly into my eyeball (WHY?). I've hiked there now in every season, seen deer mink geese squirrels chipmunks and all kinds of birds, learned to identify wildflowers I've never seen before, watched umbrella magnolias unfurl new leaves and then blossom and keep stretching toward the sun, sat by the waterfall and listened to wood thrushes and kingfishers and pileated woodpeckers, sashayed along the wide parts of the trails and squeezed through the single-file tight spots, fallen in mud and on rocks and alongside the creek, taken way too many photographs that utterly fail to capture the majesty of cliffs rocks caves, and developed such an urgent need to be there that I feel deprived if I'm away from those woods for too long. If I could find the right words to thoroughly describe the beauty and wonder of Lake Katharine, people would flock there from all over the place and I'd no longer have the trails to myself, so let's keep this as our little secret, okay? Just between us--my lips are sealed!

Okay, lousy photo, but it's exciting to see a wood thrush when they're so good at blending in.