Nature's Canvas

One nice thing about being retired is that you can up and do something without having to plan a day off of work.  This fall, my spouse and I have taken a few day trips without any real planning.  Mainly, if we notice the forecast is to be fairly nice, we then may decide to go ahead with the day trip.  Most day trips have involved hiking at a county or state park or natural area.  Yesterday, was one such day.
Even though the fall colors are well past their prime, the colors, shapes and even sounds that comprise nature's canvas can still awe.  It is much better than simply looking at the happy trees of a Bob Ross painting.

Parfrey's Glen

Noticing the day before that the forecast for November 1, All Saints Day, was to be fairly nice with partly sunny skies and temperatures near 50 degrees we decided to take a hike the next day.  We went on our way to Sauk County.  We hiked at two different locations:  Parfrey's Glen, the first state natural area, and then Devil's Lake State Park.  At Parfrey's Glen there was one other vehicle in the parking lot, but we noticed no one on our walk in or out of the glen, but did see a couple sitting at a picnic table upon our return to the parking lot.  Parfrey's Glen receives a good deal of traffic on nice weather days. I recall one day when cars lined both sides of County DL for quite some distance.  I suspect a few week ago, when colors were at their peak, the gorge was quite busy. 

Detail of brook in Parfey's Glen

Being the only two souls in the gorge allowed for an easier hike, and to listen to water of Parfrey's Glen Creek as it flows over stones, fallen leaves, and branches.  My wife was so entranced by the sound that she said that she could spend part of the day reading a book by the brook that is the stream.  Due to the flow of the water, we could not get as deep in the gorge as normal.  I suspect if it was summer I would have done so, as slipping into the water has less consequence on a warmer day than on a cool fall day. 

Striations in Baraboo Quartzite rock
at Devil's Lake State Park, boulder trail

As we are now in the latter part of fall, the trees were beyond prime, and the main colors remaining were a variation of rust--the oak trees. The mighty oak may hold on to some leaves through the winter.  There of course was a stray yellow or other bright color tree, but as we looked at the monadnocks that comprise the Baraboo Bluffs, it was the variation of rust colors that really struck our eyes.  Well lacking the vibrancy of bright reds and yellows the hardwood oaks have their own unique color variation.  A rust color with an orange tinge, a rust color with a red tinge, a rust color with a burgundy tinge provide a quilt work of patches up the sides of the bluffs.   Photographs cannot do justice to the slight color variation of which the eye can discern.  The  slight color variation was especially noticeable when we drove from Parfey's Glen to Devil's Lake.  The colors are fast disappearing now that we are in the last month of meteorological fall (Sept., Oct., Nov.).

Nature's Canvas
Rust, yellow, green and grey colors
Devil's Lake State Park

As the fall colors disappear, so to do the crowds.  The variable weather, has decreased the staying power of the fall colors.  Rain and high winds have bared the branches of trees, it seems, quicker than a less rainy and windy fall.  The Autumn Purple Ash in my yard finally got to full color, but wind and rain the next day reduced it to a mainly skeletal structure, with few determined leaves. When last at Devil's Lake in September, it was a rare day for this fall, being sunny and nice.  In September it was so nice, I could swim.  While not the crowds of summer, the park had good attendance on that weekday. 

Oak Trees growing along east face of west bluff
Devil's Lake State Park

Yesterday it was a different story, yes there were people, but it was not near what one would see in warmer weather or a nice fall day.  We hiked the boulder rock trail along the west shore of the lake.  As we hiked we could hear hikers making their way on the east bluff trail across the lake.  I realized that the number of persons at the park was so small that the background noise was essentially nonexistent, and that now, unlike summer, sounds a good distance away could easily be heard.  As I looked over the lake to the west bluff the rust colored tinge of trees, broken by the occasional yellow, was intermixed with patches of green from pine trees, not to mention the predominantly purple-gray color of the Baraboo quartzite that make up the boulder fields along the lake side bluffs.

Part of oak tree along the Boulder Trail

Besides the lack of noise, the other thing is how much different is the landscape in the fall.  With leaves coming off the trees one can notice things up a bluff not discerned during the dense foliage of summer.  As many times as we go to the same state park or natural area, there is always something to amaze, and yesterday it was the late fall color of rocks, stones, and water that make up nature's canvas.

Photos by the author, 1 November 2018

Note, for those who are interested:  Geologically, Baraboo Quartzite gets it purple to maroon color, which is interlaced with the grey, from iron (hematite) and other impurities in the stone.  The striations in some of the rocks are a throwback to the rocks original status as sandstone.  The sandstone metamorphosed into quartzite through geologic forces eons long since past.