The marsh out back

Kevin and I have been taking as many walks together as we can. He's really encouraged me a few days when I haven't felt like getting out, and as usual, my man's right on... I always feel better after a walk. Since my first surgery on my neck in January, I've tried to get in as much walking as I can. Once the weather turned nice, it was wonderful to once again take a walk in the woods. The past couple of years, our walks together had ceased because every time I looked down, my left shoulder and arm would go painfully numb... and you cannot walk through the woods, or anywhere really, without looking down. At least I can't; my clumsy gene is quite prevalent. If there is one thing I appreciate the most after this surgery, it's being able to walk in the woods again with my husband. And our dogs... those 3 love it more than any human possibly could.

A while back in April, we ended up at a marsh that's located off our northern property line on state-owned land. It was brown and wet and I was wearing sneakers. But we crossed it and came to one of the branches of the Carroll Creek drain (part of which also runs behind our house; it's man-made but now looks just like any ol' creek). We found a bridge someone had made, and we crossed over the creek, ending up walking back to our house by way of the road.

Sometimes I take my camera with me on our walks, but most often not. I didn't have it that day, and I sorely wished I had. The marsh was beautiful, as was that branch of the creek, which looks very different from ours. Our creek is overgrown and well, creeky... this was more like a small river, clean sides and swift. There were small lily pads in the creek and marsh grass just starting to turn green, and the sky was a beautiful gray. A perfect April day.

This weekend, Kev and I took a short ride on our old four-wheeler back to where the bridge is located. This time I took my camera.





Kev and I could hear water running, gushing... so we walked upstream a ways. There were several little tributaries running into the creek from the swamp. We've had quite a bit of rain lately, so it was really, really wet out there. But we could still hear loud water. We soon came upon this beaver dam...



This was the beavers' level 2... the first dam was further ahead, and you can see it in the photo above. Kev decided to go check it out. I stayed put, once again wearing sneakers. And also, everything is growing like mad out there, and frankly, all the grass mounds and water and massive growth was kind of creeping me out... I didn't feel like getting a full-on soaker. I decided to turn my camera on my hubby, and I'm so glad I did...





























Still smiling! Wet butt and all...



I enjoyed seeing all that marsh again and finding the beaver dams. I would have liked to have walked up near the bigger dam, because Kev said it wrapped around and was holding a lot of water. Beautiful. Next time I'll wear boots and thicker jeans, because that marsh area is truly not very hospitable... between the thousands of nettles coming up...



the briers and also the pickers everywhere...



and the many, many tent worm nests (yuk)...



it's kind of creepy... Right where the bridge is located, there is a big, gray mound of an anthill. I mean, that thing is HUGE; it must be years and years old. I got Kev to stand near the base of it to show the size of it...



Which wasn't really that great of an idea, since just before that he couldn't resist poking his beaver dam stick into it and stirring up a little part of it... put the ants in a frenzy...



That photo does not do any justice to what it looked like... instantly there were thousands of ants scurrying around. Kev joked that he gave them something to do that day. They retaliated by climbing all over him while he posed for my photos. Yuck. (But also quite funny from my perspective, which was quite far back actually. Thank goodness for my 12x zoom on my old Sony.)

And since I refuse to end this post with all those gross photos (hope you're not eating breakfast or lunch while you're reading this!), here's one of my favorite shots of that walk... Kev showing off his cute wet ass...