Sunday, May 20, 2012

Leg 67 from the Lanes Island Bridge into town and around Carver's Pond, ending back on Main Street.
Beginning around the Pond I was very discouraged by the enormous accummulation of trash and broken glass on the east side.  At the end of Chestnut Street there was once clearly an old dump.  These little disposals were everywhere a hundred years ago, areas selected by a family or a neighborhood to accommodate the refuse of their lives.  These always include bottles, sometime insteresting but more often smashed to pieces or, worse, shards.  During this entire journey I'd only been accompanied once, by photojournalist Peter Ralston over a year ago.  Today I wa accompanied for the seocnd time, by my daughter's dog.  By the time we'd rounded the bend she was hot on the trail of one thing or another and flying over all that debris.  I though she'd surely cut her pads to shreds but later examination revealed no injuries.  After Id gone past Red Lion Island and began around the head of the Pond the volume of trash dwindled a little and it became easier to focus on the beaty of this area.  Before long I was at Brandy Brook, site of many an adolescent expedition involving the construction of tree houses and fortifications defending those settlements from other maurading adolscents.  Brandy Brook drains a large wetland just south of Sammy's Mountain and west of Booth Quarry. Just befreo I reached Brandy Brook my camera battery went dead and I'd forgottem to bring extras.  you'd think after these years of walkign I'd have learned.