Today was very pleasant, dry and partly clear skies… in spite of this it was still a good day to be outside. To be honest, any day spent outdoors in nature is a good day.
Along the southern shore of Lake Michigan the leaves are starting to change color, in a few weeks they will mostly have fallen to the ground. This is the last hurrah for people visiting the park in large numbers, to see the Autumn colors. The lots were pretty full all day, I was fortunate to find a spot at one of the two small lots for the Cowles Bog trail.
The view across the width of the marsh. The tree line marks the end of the forested dunes which run all they way up to Lake Michigan. Although not visible here, the trail loops around the marsh and runs just inside the edge of those trees.
Every direction you looked there were the golden tones of Autumn.
Poison Ivy. It gets a bad rap but it really is a beautiful plant, especially when its leaves begin to change color. Once you learn to identify it you start to see it all over the park alongside the trails. It really thrives along this trail and with most of the rest of the ground foliage receding, it really stands out just how much of it there is. For preservation reasons the park service encourages people to stay on the trails, but you really don’t want to go wading through this stuff wearing shorts in the summer. Interestingly, Poison Ivy thrives alongside well traveled trails and its abundance falls off quickly beyond the trail.
After passing over several increasingly high sand dune ridges you descend down to Boaters Beach. Getting here is one of the most strenuous hikes in the park due to having to traverse several steep dune ridges in pure sand. It is not a place to which you are going to haul a big cooler full of iced beverages, beach chairs and such. The only other way to get here is by boat, hence the name Boaters Beach. For this reason it is never packed like other area beaches in the summer.
After a nice stroll along the beach for a few hundred yards it is time to turn inland and had back into the dunes.
It is mid October and this was the only bee, or flying insect of any kind which I came across. He was completely still which made it easy to setup this shot, usually they are in constant motion. I think this one is pretty much at the end of its life span.
Not all of the brilliant yellow is in the leaves. It pays to be looking down, as when I spotted this tiny shroom poking up among the brown fallen leaves.
Reds, oranges, yellows, greens, ochres, siennas and more contribute to natures Autumn palette.
A tight packed colony of fungi almost blend in with the colors of the fallen leaves and the decaying wood.
Black Oak leaves are some of my favorites to photograph throughout the year.
Here we are just inside the tree line, which was the subject of the first photograph of this post, which marks the end of the woods and the beginning of the marsh to the right.
Just about a quarter mile from the parking lot where I started from. One last look back at the varied colors of the trees.