Walking with Nana and Pappa: Defoliated

Iced Coffee

Well it's the Fourth of July Weekend and you know what that means.. we slept too late and the lines at the breakfast place I choose were 15 deep out the door. Drat! -- So on to plan B. I had chosen Stepping Stone Falls for our hike today but we headed further south and ended up in Richmond RI, right near where I work and went to the Fresh Ground Cafe for breakfast. We each had iced coffees (since it was almost noon) and breakfast burritos. All very good! and good service too. Since I know this area and we were on kind of a tight schedule we decided to hike in a place nearby called the Crawley Preserve, about 5 miles from the cafe in Usquepaugh, RI - I had been there sketching several times but had never walked the trails. To our surprise the Gypsy Moth caterpillars had almost completely defoliated the area. It was amazing seeing the entirety of the forest, this time of the year without leaves. It was like winter again.
However, the trails were very well marked and we were not to be deterred by a few missing leaves. We started off on the Red Dot Trail which winds it way up a hilly countryside with several switchbacks to keep me from puffing too much. You can see in the picture that the leaves are just gone, but the trail is wide and the walking is very easy and the scenery is still

No Leaves

No leavesvery nice. Even though it was a hot July day and we didn't have much cover, it was cool enough that I didn't work up my usual lather. Along the red dot trail we met a lady who said she live just down the road, she was walking her dog, a large white handsome dog of some unknown breed. We chatted for a few minutes and came away with a lot of local knowledge about the area and about the trails. For the longest route she recommended talking the red trail to the blue trail and the blue trail to the yellow trail which would lead us back to the parking area. This is exactly what we ended up doing. Along the way there were trail markers with numbers on them - we have learned since that they match up with a trail guide and point out natural features. We need to walk this again with the guide in hand. At he far end of the preserve we could see signs of civilization but soon were back into the forest. Interestingly the caterpillars were in the stage of development where they were becoming moths..and the woods were swarming with little white moths, amazing.

We found the yellow trail

The trail system here was one of the best marked trails system we have walked. All the blazes were fresh and bright and they were close enough together that you never had to search them out. The yellow trail had the most diversity of terrain with a brook and large glacial boulders strewn along the way. Even thought he walking was easy the views were fantastic. The yellow trail also was just a bit greener than the rest of this defoliated forest with lush ferns and raspberry bushes, once we got near the brook, anyway. As we neared the finish of our two mile walk, a white tailed deer leapt across the trail just in front of Nana, giving her a start and it was gone before I looked up. We had heard several wild critter thrashing around in the brush from time to time and supposed it was deer, this confirmed it. After returning to the car, we drove down the hill to the Kenyon Grist Mill, a Rhode Island favorite. And now some more photos.