Since I last posted, husband and I have taken three hikes. Actually, the first two were actual hikes, while the third was driving around through woods and past lakes and sitting in nature.

I’d earlier attempted to post each week, letting you all in on my inspiration for settings for my stories. Practically anything out of doors would do. However, lately I failed in my weekly posts. Apologies.

One hike was part of the North Country Trail we hadn’t been on before. A 13-mile section goes through our town. Funny, how we’d seen this one blue bridge across the Kalamazoo River for the past nearly 15 years and always wondered about it. We finally ventured on it, going west from Helmer Road. We hadn’t even realized it was part of the North Country Trail until we were walking upon it. And there was another foot bridge not far away, always hidden from us all these years in the woods.

We heard traffic from the 4-lane road across the river until that road turned north. Then we heard planes, trains, and coo-coo birds (aka sandhill cranes). There were other birds we also saw and heard on our hour hike, but not a single other human. Our Carlson type of trail.

The following day we took another hour+ hike in Custer State Recreation Are about 15 minutes from our house. There are numerous choices for trails within this park. We focused around Eagle Lake – the beach and the river and the woods. It was a Saturday, plus the temperatures had sored up into the forty’s, so there were several people walking about there on that day.

And that brings us to last Friday. Poor hubby was weakened by a cold, so we took a drive through the many tree-lined back roads, up to (*Public Hunting Area), and finally back to our favorite nearby park (Custer) to eat our lunch in the car with a view of Whitford Lake. A swan came out to say How’d you do? then swam away. How pleasant.