Wordless Wednesday...

Secret, sacred places...

I've been to this place many times but its been a while since I've visited

so I thought I'd give you a little tour again...

 ...down through the woods to the bend in the creek sits a little raft on a cable...

 ...we call it the pull ferry (its self propelled) and Griffs always up for the ride!

 ...it always feels like I'm passing through into another world...

 ...a secret world of childhood dreams...

The woods on the other side are deep and rich and full of life...

 Skunk cabbage grows big on these rain filled boggy paths...

 ...also called swamp lantern because of its gorgeous, strange, spiky flowers...

 I must cut through the farmers field to get around these spots...there's Annie's house where

I had tea that morning..."Hi Annie!"

In no time these grasses will be shoulder high and like tigers we'll sneak through in the summer heat..

 We went to Annie's this morning to see her pink fawn lilies ( you can read more about that here)

 and lo and behold there was some over here too just finishing up their show...

The false lily of the valley was a thick carpet all along the paths...

 ...just getting ready to show it's tiny white flowers any day now...

 ...meandering...

 ...nests of summers past...

Up onto the suspension bridge...

 Yes, that was where Wordless Wednesday was!

 Down by the swimming hole, the water is still too high on the riverbanks to walk

along the shore, but come July our toes will once again

be tickled by tiny fish in dappled cooling waters...

 For now we wander back through the woods...spotting evidence of the sapsuckers...

 ...witnessing the changing colours of the dying trillium...

 Instead of fading, her colours turn vibrant in one last show

...and if you follow an old road, past the weathered fence posts,

treading carefully across the rotting bridge you'll spot a tree...

...not just any tree...look closely...at the bottom...

 ...a sad tale of the woodcutter who loved his wife and child but lost them tragically and

carved his pain into the wood.

Actually I made that part up...they are my trees of mystery of which I know nothing

but I like to imagine him out here on a summers evening with

his tools and a beer...immortalizing those he lost

Heading back, I glance  once more down the secret creek 

and dream of warmer summer afternoons...

These places have become sacred, secrets to me and the few I choose to share them with.

They're worth the quiet whispers and unwritten maps, the places

where sometimes you just have to hold them close.