Mondays in the Nelson Wilds: A Little Bit of April Fool's on Granite Lake Brook

Okay, let me state for the record that I generally stink at doing April Fool's jokes. So it was with a fair bit of trepidation that I planned a couple tricks for our hike today. Mostly because I can't keep a straight face. So here's what I decided to do. I had some silly string and some jelly beans. First thing I did was spray some silly string on a dead tree limb and the ground while Al was still back at his car getting ready to go. Then I called him over to see if he could tell me what it was. I stood back while he picked it up and sniffed it. As long as he couldn't see my face, I could keep my composure. "So," I asked innocently, "what do you think it is?" "Hmmm, some kind of fungus, mycelia, or someone playing with crazy string." "Well, your third guess is right," I said, as I pulled out the can of silly string in my pack.

The second joke was a little harder to pull off because I couldn't get the jelly beans out of my pack easily. But eventually I found a way to get them out and sprinkled them in the snow, and waited....Al was off exploring in the woods and I had to wait for him to get back to where I was. When he arrived, I pointed to the snow, and said, "Here is some scat that I have never seen before." He looked down at the very colorful "scat" and I said, "It's Easter Bunny scat!" Then we ate it! And Al told me about a special kind of coffee that is actually eaten by mere cats or something, and pooped out, then cleaned and ground. Apparently it's really good coffee. No fooling!

Anyway, back to the hike. This week, we decided to explore along Granite Lake Brook between Granite Lake Road below Priscilla Walter's house and the bridge over the brook at Taylor Mill Road (a class six road off of Granite Lake Road). The brook winds back and forth through a wetland bordered by the road on the northwest and a woodland slope on the southeast. We followed the southeast shoreline of the brook up from the road. It didn't take long to find canine tracks, though we weren't sure whether they were dog or coyote. My guess is coyote. The next tracks we found were fox. The tracks wound with the river, back and forth, up and down the riverbank.

Most wetland areas we have visited have evidence of beaver activity and this place was no exception. We saw beaver-chewed twigs and branches, an old dam and beaver-felled trees. We found tracks that we don't often find--beaver tracks. Amazingly, we also found drag marks in the snow and pieced together how the beaver had chewed down a hazelnut branch and dragged it back to the river.

We also found otter and mink tracks, as one would expect when one follows a stream or river. The brook was getting louder, the further upstream we traveled. We also found some interesting human artifacts along the way, on the opposite bank--a swing, a couple of tables, a lawn mower. Further up the river, a plastic rocking chair, with a perfect view of the river. The river was getting louder and more wild, raging from the snow melt. A spectacular cascade of water. Al exclaimed, "I didn't know we had this in Nelson." It is a beautiful place. What more is there to say than that?

At the bridge, we walked up Taylor Mill Road to Granite Lake Road, past the Spragues and the Tuttles. The bank on this side of the river was steep and we waited until we were also past the dog daycare business before we headed back down to the river. I stayed close to the river bank and Al ventured into the woods until we got to the swing and tables that we had seen from the opposite shore. There we stopped to rest and eat, enjoying the view of the river.

The clouds were rolling in and we soon found ourselves walking in the rain, falling gently at first, then harder until we hurried back to the road in pelting rain and ice pellets. Our friend, Russ, drove by at that moment, and we talked for a short time. But the weather encouraged us to return to the car, and finish our upstream/ downstream exploration, until next time.