Take a hike

To take her mind off some things a bit, Risa went up to Fall Creek with Last Son; we walked for three hours. That covered only a small portion of the trail; it's over twenty miles long. It's not far at all from Stony Run.

As you can immediately grasp, we're not really the best farm country. But we're fairly scenic!

He's the same age as Risa was when she came to work in these woods ... no, actually about two years older! How time flies when you're having fun. We identified Douglas fir, Western hemlock, Bigleaf maple, Viney maple, Cascara, Pacific yew, mountain willow, mountain alder, thimbleberry, salmonberry, false Solomon's seal, skunk cabbage, trillium, twinflower, bleeding heart, wood sorrel, maidenhair fern, sword fern, bracken, miner's lettuce, wild ginger, vanilla leaf. And banana slugs. 

Oh, and a merganser. The young man observed, from a pretty good ways away, that the duck did not have the broad bill that our farm ducks or mallards have. Do they eat different stuff? "Bingo," said Risa. "They eat fish!" "Ahh!" he said. "That explains it." Risa was really proud of him.

Contemplates washing his muddy boots

Mission accomplished