Rain Lily I think this is Vaccinium arboreum, aka: farkleberry. After we took down our campsite at Bastrop State Park we mosyed on over to Buescher State Park for some hiking before we headed home. I didn’t want to get home too late so we didn’t opt for a long hike. Chris put together a loop out of the park trail map that was about two miles long. Forest ended up falling asleep on the way over to the state park so I carefully managed to get him in the Ergo where he managed to fall right back asleep. It was overcast and not long after we got on the…

Two weekends ago we finally went on our first family camping trip. We’ve tried to go a few times this spring but have had to cancel at the last minute for a variety of reasons. A weekend opened up and Chris was able to find a site at Bastrop State Park for one night. This state park and about 30,000 other acres were burned heavily back in September 2011. The area is very slowly recovering but much of the ‘lost pines’ that the area is known for was torched and is left standing as only canopyless pine logs. It’s pretty devastating and I can only imagine how gorgeous the area…

It was 2012 the last time we were at Huntsville State Park. We were planning to camp last weekend but bad weather on Saturday deterred us from venturing out. I think had we not had Forest we might have attempted it, but it worked in our favor anyway as Forest came down with a nasty cough and it was probably better he wasn’t outside in a tent overnight. Chris still wanted to get out and do something on Sunday so instead of hitting up Sam Houston National Forest again we opted for Huntsville State Park as they have a diverse trail system and we enjoyed our last visit there. The…

Carolina jessamine, Gelsemium sempervirens was in bloom everywhere. A pileated woodpecker hole??? Rubus trivialis, southern dewberry Last weekend we jaunted back over to Jones State Forest for a short hike. Google Earth was giving me a pain but my estimate is that we walked a short 2.25-2.5 mile loop. We started at the most western parking lot on the south side of FM 1488 and headed down the west perimeter ‘trail’, Jones Trail. We turned east on the Upper Horsepen Trail and then cut-up to the north on Cochran Trail before heading back west on the Middle Lake Trail. Before getting to the lake we cut back north on the…

It’s been a long winter! It’s been far longer since I’ve done any hiking, last May when we were at Nails Creek State Park and I was six or seven months pregnant. We’ve had some nice stretches of weather these last few weeks intermingled with cool spells, but this last week we were in the middle of a beautiful stretch so I mentioned to Chris that I wanted our first Valentines Day as a family to be a hike. I decided early on I wanted to carry Forest in the Ergo carrier but then I got to thinking that I thought he might be big enough for the Osprey Poco…

Our trip to McKinney Falls State Park was very short as the sun was already low on the horizon that afternoon. We visited both the upper and lower falls but our plans to see the old cypress in the park were thwarted when learning that the bridge on the trail to the cypress was out. Apparently it was a little rough crossing and I doubt a stroller was going to make that trek. So, we made it a short trip and decided we’d have to see the rest of the park another time.