The hike that wasn't

Reading through the Town's conservation commission website the other day, I learned about some new places to hike, one of which is just up the street, about 400 acres.   COOL!   Was looking for somewhere to wear out Miss Fizz today before finishing up my great-grandmother's cookie recipe.     Trail leading back into the woods, 2 ponds that were dug by the Army Corp of Engineers to be skating ponds, land bridge between them.........awesome!

Or so it should have been.   Turned out to be a huge disappointment in terms of hiking. :(  Beavers had taken over, and trails were gone.   We ended up on some deer trails, bushwacking just to wear out the Wuppy.

The above photo is how things started....and quickly deteriorated to this.  The spit of land with the day-glow moss....that was our 'trail' through the beaver-generated swamp. :(

Fizz and I next to a recently 'cut' tree.    And yeah....you can see why I detest wearing hats.  I look utterly stupid in them.

On the way back, we passed through an old gravel/sand pit.   Gave me an opportunity to do a bunch of training/work with Fizz in an exciting environment (do you KNOW how much fun sand-eating is for a 15wk puppy???).   Worked on reward zone on both left and right, call once recalls, collar grabs, and several rounds of hide and seek.    Finally, we discovered the ultimate treasure:  a water bottle with ice in it!   I released her to attack it and boy did she have fun.  Awesome reward to end our training session! :)

I need some updated photos of Fizz, but I need to get the SLR out.......this P&S don't cut it in my mind for portraits!