Bald Hill and Grumpy Cat Two

I got happy the other day.  That's because I made time to take a walk in a favorite park.  Over in Corvallis.  At Bald Hill.

I love that park.  I used to live near it.  I recovered after back surgery by walking up it four times a week.

There are miles of trails.  You can access the park from an Oak Creek Drive parking lot, a half mile or so from 53rd, or on Reservoir Road, or from an entrance to the south of the fairgrounds on 53rd, where the bike path comes from campus, through the fields, clear from 35th st., including over a covered bridge.

Miles of the paths are paved.  Others are not.  You can go up off the paved path, at the porta potty, up the hill where the barn relic is, then head up Bald Hill proper, on foot, mountain bike, or horse, although the horses are supposed to remain on the special horse trail to avoid you know what left on the main trails.

About halfway up, the trail splits and you can head on up the trail you were on, or cut to the right and skirt the west side of Bald Hill and finally come down and along the bottom of Bald hill all the way back to the north and east and come out at the barn.  When almost to the barn, you can cut to the left on a trail that winds around, crosses some creeks, then cuts straight between pastures to a gravel road and you go back down to the Oak Creek parking lot from there.  Or you can turn to the left, go up the gravel road to another trail that goes up another hill, in the forest.

Anyhow I love it.  And I get happy when I go there, and for several days after.

Gratitudes

  Enter the forest and head up Bald Hill from this hole in the forest wall. Bald Hill park is a magical world to me.

Bald Hill trees are works of art full of character and life.

This is the Flip Off Tree.  That's my name for it.  I don't know what pisses off a tree, but I'm sure trees too get pissed off.  I looked up the hill, in the direction of the flip off, but could not discover, with my non tree brain, what might have brought a tree to such anger.

Flip off tree, side view.  A flip off by a tree, is a very very lengthy insult.

There you go, straight on.  The finger, so to speak, from a tree.  I guess I should say,  "the branch". 

This tree seems to be busy and comfortable with friends.

And these trees seem engaged in dance or conversation.  As I said, the trees of Bald Hill are of exceptional  character and beauty.

A bench and billboard halfway up Bald Hill.  This bench sits where the trail forks.  

This poor dog was lost on the trail and still is not found.  The fliers were everywhere.

The creeks are very dry, for this time of year.  We need rain.

I visited some Lebanon friends, the people who almost exactly a year ago, called me about cats they needed help getting fixed.  Well, it was a lot of cats.  24 or so kittens and 16 or so adults.  Now, a year later, they had a big male show up, tame but not fixed, hungry, sort of a train wreck.  The back of one ear is raw from him scratching at it from having ear mites.  So I coaxed him close and scruffed him.

He looks just like Grumpy Cat, the now famous frowning feline.  At least I think he does.  He'll be fixed tomorrow.

Isn't he awesome?  He has mats and fleas and earmites and is older and drools.  But isn't he awesome?

This is not so awesome.  He's scratched himself raw because he has ear mites.