Adirondack LettersNo.17: An April Walk. Hints of Balsam and Pine: Nature Reflections in a minor key from our quiet corner of the Adirondacks. For Fourpeaks Guests and anyone who ever dreamed about a wilderness getaway. CLICK & GO! (On this page.) Adirondack Letter No.17: "An April Walk." Photo Essay: 30 photos with captions. For better flower photos (35mm film, Nikon F3), seeTrillium at Sugar Camp in '97. There's more at Adirondack Nature Photographs. A few more words about Spring. (On the next page.) List and Links to all the Adirondack Letters in this series. 
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"An April Walk" Adirondack Letter No.17 Subject: An April Walk Date: Mon, 17 Apr 2006 19:22:09 From: Martin (Your Adirondack Guide) To: Fourpeaks Visitors At: < youremailname@youremail.address > Dear Fourpeaks Visitor, In town yesterday doing my taxes, Don reminded me he hadn't gotten a newsletter from me in some time. He's not the kind of person I think of as having an interest in "creative" writing, so I couldn't explain my problem. Instead I invited him for a little nature walk. Too fragile and evanescent for words alone, the sights, sounds and and feel of early April came across better with photos. There's a photo essay link below (* indicates photo). It began the first morning I realized I didn't need a woodfire. So the woodpile's down but there's no anxiety about it and no need to fill it up any time soon(*). Time, too, to stop feeding the winter flock of chickadees, paired off now in their forest breeding ground. Today the brook nearby runs full and I follow George splashing in it, exuberant and playful(*). Native cinnamon fern will soon luxuriate along its borders. Years ago I planted royal fern and other exotics I mail-ordered from Washington--a painful fragment of memory that always surfaces in this situation. Leaf mold is brown and red(*). Ebenezer and Rattlesnake overlook the open field with a winter countenance of just evergreen and empty space where the hardwoods will bloom. But the ground below has a blush of light green and George circles round very fast, over again, urging me to come and play in it(*). The ice-downed oak Willy drew out from along the base of Bassett is just about gone, but the new ash and maple from Sid Maicus stands high(*). I'm satisfied to look over the good supply of firewood in logs and blocks. My wheel tracks in mud have dried and the scars of winter are healing(*). I find the spot a nest of angry bees kept me from mowing last Fall--a patch now of fragile field flowers frozen in time below the sky and mountains. I get down below them shooting up(*). The digital results are nothing like the macro film photos with my Nikons years ago but there's a sense of immediacy with the poorer definition. They say Halsey Straight got two crops of hay from the low spot by camp gate, the soil rich from eons of water flow. The bottom stayed wet all Summer. I had Bill Lincoln cut a water channel with his excavator years ago to dry it out. Today there's a line of volunteer apples, a mix of ancient varieties, hard and tart, excellent for jam(*). Pussy willow proliferates, the furry blooms, an ornament for the season(*). Red alder makes an impenetrable jungle of wood on the other side all the way to Straight's Farmhouse Field. His cellar is still there and I've cut the brush out to preserve it. The well is down a short ways with a cover on it and a pump that works. New Camp looks still at the mountains and at the last remaining popple of the five I spared at the time. The apple's alive, buds ready to burst. Pine stumps cut to the ground years ago are hardly visible. Across the road the cherry I worried about for years and tried to save--a twitch of memory. I open my walking chair and sit by a pair of birch saplings making their way at wood's edge(*). I avoid speculating on what the future has in store them. The warm sun and the present moment is enough for them and me. Enough for George, too, who sits all the while at my feet, at rest taking it all in(*). On the way to Sugar I scare a brooding partridge and stop to examine the eggs concealed in rough thatch(*). Except for a single spruce there was no shade where I built it. I let an overhanging popple live, but they don't last and I knew that by then. So I was very happy when a maple started up at the far corner of the building by the well where the trailer people had an outdoor grill I took down. I took care to cut down the growth around and it prospered--until a couple of years ago when several main limbs failed to leave and died back. Willy pointed out the porcupine damage and he came with his son to take care of the problem. But that tree was a sad sight all last year. I went over just this week, thinking I'd have to do something or cut it down. Later, cautioning him to take care not to disturb the abundant water shoots, I brought Billy over with the saw and had him cut all the dead limbs away. The trunk is a full six inches across and healing(*). [PHOTO ESSAY] To see the photos(*) I took on the walk with Don [CLICK HERE] http://4peaks.com/fkhint17.htm --there's thirty of them. Many thanks for reading this. If you've ever been a guest here, go to http://4peaks.com/fgift.htm for an attractive discount offer. Please visit us again. If you've never been--check our up-to-date Availability Calendar http://4peaks.com/femail0.htm and make some time. There's a lovely quiet season coming up. Till then Visit Us On-Line: http://4peaks.com/ "Explore our 700-acre rest and play-ground." http://4peaks.com/fcamp.htm Backcountry Cabins in a Hidden Valley. http://4peaks.com/fotrails.htm Walks with views & Beauty spots. http://4peaks.com/fgstbndx.htm Photo Guest Book--Meet our guests! http://4peaks.com/foamen.htm "Luxury Camping" Your Adirondack Guide, Martin (and George) P.S. If you liked this letter, save it for the links, and tell a friend! If you didn't like it, please send it back with "REMOVE" as the subject. Thanks. Member Whiteface Mountain Visitors Bureau Member Lake Placid/Essex County Visitors Bureau ************************************************************* This is No.17 of a really occasional Letter, "Hints of Balsam and Pine from our Corner of the Adirondacks," for Fourpeaks guests or anyone who ever inquired about a Fourpeaks Vacation/Getaway. To get off this list reply with "REMOVE" in the subject heading. ************************************************************* A few more words about Spring (from an email to a friend). I always pooh-pooh talk about the weather and all that. But I think I respond to the Spring. Working on photos and a new newsletter on that subject. It's gorgeous. The early sun and the earth warming up. My birthday is early March and I think it's then I begin anticipating the change in myself and in nature all around. We bury the dead that didn't make it through and go about what we are doing with new energy. With me the model for this is the life on the land around. So I'm clearing deadfall, fixing buildings and making new plans. It's the season. Martin
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