Beautiful Fall Day

Last double digit trail run before Stonecat this morning. Yikes - that means the race is only 2 weeks away!!! Got out on this gorgeous October day for another run down to Head of Tides. I know I won't be able to run out there after Stonecat, as hunting season will be starting up and the trails outside the Cathance are still new enough that it seems like it wouldn't be safe, so I wanted to take advantage of the opportunity today. My legs felt tired but it was a good run. It's just so beautiful out there, running along narrow singletrack through the birch groves and along the calm river. Saw a deer bounding across the trail, but other than that, the woods were quiet. 

When I got home, we headed to Broadway Deli for brunch and then over to Maine Running Company to pick up a few gels before driving out to Wolfe's Neck for their October hayrides. We visited the farm and saw all the animals, including the new guinea pigs in the barn - they are so cute, tiny and friendly, with lots of funny little noises and grunts. I wonder what the cats would think if we brought one home? We asked Sam and she said, no, we shouldn't do that, they'd probably poop in the house. Ha. Then we took the wagon ride out to the pumpkin patch and picked pumpkins under the blue sky. 

Wagon ride

In the pumpkin patch

Beautiful pumpkin blossom

Family portrait with pumpkins :-)

Then it was time for "nature tracking"! (Sam has been watching "Dinosaur Train" and the dinosaur kids do a lot of nature tracking) We took a long walk out on the trails behind the farm, stopping every few feet on the way out to pick up twigs, lichen, acorns and leaves. The trail dead-ended at the edge of a field and headed down into a gorge. We wandered that way and found bones! Lots of them, in fact. We theorized that a little calf might have wandered down there and not been able to get out. It was pretty interesting, actually, as the bones were clean so it wasn't gross. Sam said it "was a very cool discovery!" 

Bones! (Yes, we let our child pick up the bones...and used a lot of hand sanitizer afterwards)

Sam was asking for "uppy" on the way back, code for "I'm tired and bored and really don't want to walk anymore." The answer to this is always, "Let's run." In this case, I think Ryan said, let's see if you can run on the trails as fast as Mama does. Ha. But it worked! Sam took off running, and ran the whole mile back, with a few aid station stops for water :-) She was pretty fast too!

Trail running

Sam toward the end of her run, with a bit of hiking on the "obstacles"

It was the perfect way to spend a beautiful fall day - running, nature tracking, picking pumpkins and visiting with the animals!