I met Karla in Sparta to ride with her to Cummings Falls State Park. It was a pretty meandering ride thru the countryside to get to the park. There is a campground across the road from the entrance to the Park, with a general store.
We pulled into the parking lot and Karla decided to move as close to the edge of the gravel lot as she could. When she backed up and then pulled forward we heard a scraping noise. I got out to see what we might have trapped under her CRV and saw an orange cone wedged between the front wheel and the side fender. And it was wedged tight! I pulled and pulled and then had her back up to smush it under the tire. Then it wedged between the tire and front fender. She pulled forward again and it wedged under the car. We were entertaining some guys that were standing in the parking lot watching us, they felt sorry for us and came over and pulled the cone out. Only it was 3 cones stacked together.
Phew!
We were early for Anthony's Photography/Wildflower excursion so we hiked toward the Cummings Falls overlook. We got distracted by the wildflowers and turned back before we got to the overlook.
Found Anthony at the trailhead, along with some other ladies ready to see the wildflowers. After some pointers from Anthony for taking better pictures, we started out on the Downstream trail stopping to take pics of everything blooming. One girl was a botany student seeking the scientific names for the flowers, I offered her my book, Anthony gave her the scientific word he knows: SCIENCE, that's very scientific. No Latin needed. We were going to the secret waterfall to see the abundance of blooms in that area. It's beautiful here with high rock walls, two waterfalls, the river side, and wildflowers everywhere. The Botany student found a newt, a salamander, I found the remains of a frog.... Karla practiced with Anthony's bag of tricks. It was thundering and then it started to sprinkle. Karla and I started back and walked down the riverside trying to find the trail we came in on. We discovered some bluebells, and prairie trilliums by going the wrong way. We found the trail and on the way up it started raining, but I was prepared with my rain jacket and hat, but it was humid and too warm and we thought it would stop. We pressed on, going to see the big waterfall at the overlook trail, rain came down harder so we put on the rain gear. By the time we got back to the parking lot we looked like drowned rats, and then the sun came out.
Lunch was at a great Mexican place in Cookeville. Hungry hikers. Then a little retail therapy for us girls.
It was a beautiful day to spend with my friend Karla, and with Anthony who got me started searching for wildflowers years ago.
Pictures:
No comments:
Post a Comment