Tundra Trail

I could use a number of differing titles for this post -- back to our roots and frozen - for some believe the Curlies came from Siberia - and for part of our trip, that's where it seemed we were... Frozen and Lost ??  Wrong Turn somewhere and frozen...   brilliant blue frozen in time ---   hmmm... do we see a pattern here ? Frozen being the key word. everything was frozen but gorgeous. :)  I took so many photo's (as usual) but we were out a long time and each sight was so overwhelmingly amazing !!   

Here's a bit of a view of the general direction we are heading today .. we trot down French Meadow Road , travel through North Springfield (where we hit civilization and sidewalks), cross Route 10/106 to our agreed upon destination of the day - the floodplains.    This sun is deceiving folks...  It's brilliant but cold,  6 degrees when we left the barn

Along the way we spot some turkeys roosting on the fence.. we saw a lot of turkeys on this trip-- one large flock kept flying ahead of us in one section of trail.

We are off road now for awhile--- headed up the snowmobile trail which follows along the airport.

This "trail" is a virtual highway !  and the horses are pleased to find.. it's not going to be like the trail they were stuck on last time.. with deep snow and hard work.

We want to choose the trail for 106N... now if there had been a few more directional clues like this one along the way -- we would have avoided a lot of wandering -- BUT we also would have missed a great new adventure.

more signs -- a bit comical...

Don't we love a caution when we are on horseback

Just thinking about the implications of this - makes me blind too.






Not to worry - our horses are steeds of bravery and steadiness.

As we trot along -- we follow the fence which encloses the airstrip. Here's a view of Mount Ascutney..  it's a tall mountain so we see it from a lot of our voyages - and I have mentioned before , it's a goal of mine to travel up it on horseback. 

we reach the river trail -- this is the river you are gazing out onto.. totally frozen and covered in snow.

We trot along the river trail and decide to head over to what all the locals call the Power Dam.  There was once several mills there powered by the powerful waterfall-- and let me say.. in the spring and summer when the water is full bore - you can hear the roar of those falls from far away -






Today ... amazing - the dam is (guess what) frozen. Although we can see the water still flowing under the ice -- what an awesome sight - one that I could not seem to capture on camera.









Here's a photo from a summer trip to compare.

icicles cascade down the rocky ledge shores of the river.


Zoe and I opt to head straight here - never having been up this way before- thinking it might head toward Perkinsville and we can choose a way home from there.  But ... we dead end and Zoe (the 'map' of the trip as she says) thinks she knows another way to loop around.

More snowy tundra

You know how people use the phrase-- this is the beginning of the end ? well here is the beginning of an end that took forever to reach.  we chose to go right... found some super trail - BUT.... not anywhere near where we thought we wanted.

We were treated to stupendous views along the way. We are anxious for a number of reasons -- can't wait to find out where we are in an excited way... reluctant to find out where we are in a nervous way :)  Still enjoying ourselves though !!







Uh-oh..... as soon as we spot this little covered bridge-- we know exactly where we are. I spy this bridge from the road in my car so often and wish to myself-- there's a little bridge I want to cross with Keri -- but... I guess it's so true- be careful for wishing. Yikes.. we are far from homebase.  But -- the positive is. as I said - we know where we are.

Although I have always wanted to cross this little bridge -- I am not even going to ask my mare to trudge through the snow -- we'll come back another time..   we trot on .. cross over onto more trail, pretty confident our memory serves us correctly.. and we will be headed in the right direction.  By this time - it's all we can think about .. reaching home ! trot down half the length of Baltimore Road.. the chill is setting in.. the sights are not so alluring now :)  Out onto Route 106..  where we could get on more trail but we say -- jeezum crow.. let's just book it down the highway.

Back into North Springfield -- past the Main Street Market.... over the backroads-- where we walked the last two miles to cool the horses down --  our thoughts are totally focused on -- we're cold, we're hungry, our feet feel as though we are wearing Frankenstein boots... and do you think the horses could un-tack themselves and put themselves away when we get back to the farm ? 

well it wasn't that bad-- we had a super trip and I can't wait till the next one :) We have one planned for Zoe's birthday -- but news of 2 feet of snow coming our way may put the cabash on that idea for a few days.  Drat !!

I hope you enjoyed our adventure... at some point I will post the longer version on the farm blog... the scenery was outstanding - I took SO many photo's...  I know the post is a long one -- but I just love to
share :)

Enjoy ~