Pine Street Woods

Pine Street Woods is my morning routine for walking Mollie. It is a short drive and the trails are relatively empty early in the morning, even on a fine summer morning like this morning’s. I tend to see one or two mountain bikers, maybe a group of runners. I often meet Sue and Amber as she is up most mornings even earlier than I. We met last winter and bump into each other occasionally in the woods or in town as she lives close by. I always enjoy our short conversations. She is soft spoken but not afraid to let you know what is on her mind. She has spent years walking these woods so always has some nice stories to relate.

Last week Mollie and I were walking up Green Heart trail and Mollie suddenly changed her mood and started sniffing the air uphill of us intensely. She also stayed close and indicated she wanted to be leashed up, which I accommodated. Knowing a bear had been seen a couple of times recently we continued or walk up the switchbacks cautiously. Mollie remained anxious and finally she spy-hopped to look over some weeds and we both caught sight of a dark form uphill of us. It turned out to be a cow moose browsing high up in a tree. We moved on rapidly not wanting to disturb it.

Two days later Vicki and I were up walking Pine Cone and she spotted the moose again just off the trail. We leashed up Mollie and as we moved away two calves ran into view, one to the mother and the other down the trail away from us. We reversed course and warned others we me. We had a nice glimpse of the young ones.

This morning dawned bright since the rain a few days ago. The smoke that had settled into the area from Oregon fires was gone. The sky, blue again and the world seems right. With the hot dry weather the grasses are blonding now and some of the foliage has burned enough to almost give a fall feel to the colors.

I brought my Fuji GFX 50s ii camera and a Mamiya 120mm f4 macro lens adapted to it. This lens is good for intimate photos. The macro is good but difficult to use handheld. These are all shown without post-processing using the Provia or Externa film simulations. What follows are a few photos, nothing special just an idea of the morning.