The Eno bridge is open!

More photos later, but for now just these of the newly opened bridge over the Eno River (at West Point on the Eno). Nice to enjoy the other side of the park!

Hi deer!

Spotted one morning last week on a road near Duke Forest.

Down by the Little River

I've visited the Little River Regional Park several times over the last month. It's actually in Orange County, about a mile north of the Durham/Orange border, and it's run jointly as a partnership between the two counties. There are two main hiking trails, mountain bike trails and an ADA-friendly loop paved with asphalt. The latter is referred to as an interpretive trail, though I didn't discover anything that needed translation.
The two main trails go down by the Little River itself which is more creek-like than river-like. The south river trail took me about 45 minutes and the ridge/north river loop took about 90 minutes. Both are relatively easy and largely unused -- in three times hiking there I've seen a total of four other people hiking. The trails are well-marked with signs with the glaring exception of one point on the south river loop; because of that J and I ended up walking around for a while on some really nice private paths that border the park which you're really not supposed to do. There are no signs on those paths either, so it took us a while to figure out which way to go to get back on the right trail. (And no way were we going to retrace our steps, though I did have moments of horror imagining getting lost in a park that close to my house.)
There are some nice clean bathrooms there (definitely a plus), a butterfly garden area (that was roped off) and one of those horrible generic plastic and metal climbing structures that any kid in his/her right mind would be bored to tears from after ten minutes. Also, there's a picnic shelter and some open spaces for tossing a Frisbee around.
I've spotted lots of animals there -- deer, turtles, groundhogs (I think) and rabbits. I kept having the feeling when I was hiking that there might be a bear just around the corner, but fortunately never saw one. It's definitely recommended if you're interested in getting lost in the woods (figuratively) for a while.

A walk to the Eno

One of the nice things about the new house -- oh, one of the many -- is living to so close to West Point on the Eno. I walked down the "secret path" (aka, where the sewer lines run) this morning and captured a few images along the way.

There were lots of workers out this morning setting up for the annual Festival for the Eno in July. Looks like the new pedestrian is almost ready for use.Lovely graffiti under the Roxoboro Road bridge. And a lovely Andy Goldsworthy moment with a leaf.