The Eno River: A new hiking venue for the Loyds

The first chance we got in April, Judy and I

headed off to Eno River State Park, just west

of Durham.  We took a beautiful scenic route

on backroads from Chapel Hill and never

encountered any traffic.  Let's take a tour.

The amazing number of turtles sunning themselves
was the first thing we noticed.

The trail we hiked before lunch was fairly level and
suitable for all ages.  It basically followed the river.

A turtle closeup.  Typically, we'd see several, but by
the time I could get close enough for a picture only
a couple remained.

We observed a lot of interesting natural
formations.  "X" marks the spot!

You don't see too many rapids on piedmont rivers,
but this made us feel like we were in the mountains.

I haven't identified this lovely plant yet, but it
was quite prolific.

Note the little "fiddletops" of these newly
emerging Christmas ferns.

This is a troll hole 'fer shur.'

I think Gandalf may have turned some evil
creature into this odd formation.

The black rat snake is the first of two
nice specimens we spotted that day.  Judy
saw both of them first.

I thought this view of solitary violets blooming on
this ancient log was picturesque. (FIRST time using
that word on this blog!)

These parallel fallen saplings would have
been a tempting footbridge for some folks.
Not me, not today!

Ducks or geese, you tell me.

Hmm.  All kinds of possibilities here!

Is this the way deer mark trees?

Our second snake was a beauty of a King Snake.

Not only did this turtle wait for me, he
appears to be waving!

A favorite woodland plant of mine, running
ground cedar (or ground pine).

The William Few that this historic ford was named
after ended up in Georgia and was a signer of the
U.S. constitution (right next to Abraham Baldwin, Caryn)!

One of the few places the trail rose was for the
express purpose of viewing these rapids, the most
impressive on the entire Eno.

The turtles definitely preferred the more placid spots.

I finally got around to identifying these papery leaves
as beech.  I had observed it from here to Georgia
all along the interstate and in neighborhoods last winter.

I wish we had this tree on our SFL Nature Trail.
We have a Slingshot Tree.  This could be "L'il
Slingshot Tree.

This bridge would have led to many more miles of
trails we didn't have time or energy for that day.
But we plan to visit this park in the future.

Our return hike led us down, down, down . . .

. . . and up, up, up!

It was worth the steep climb to see this view.

In fact, everything we saw at the Eno River

State Park impressed us.  We'd like to see it

at different seasons and experiment with

different trails.  It's just a little over 90 minutes

from our house and well worth the trip.

Let me know if you want to know the shortcut,

but there's no need to go through Durham's traffic.