Nature Ride

I have been meaning to blog about our first nature walk for quite a while now. I have also been fighting with blogger to get the pictures uploaded for quite sometime now!

One of the things Charlotte Mason is very strong about is taking the children for a nature walk everyday to let them learn from the things that surround them. We decided that instead of walking, we would ride our bikes towards adventure.

Our first ride was on a beautiful sunny day.

We jumped on our bikes and headed south east across the Tule bypass and towards the mountains.

The first thing we encountered was the river that had flooded just a few weeks back. We stopped to see how the water had left evidence of how high it had gotten. We also talked about how the river is poluted and how wonderful it would be if the people would take more interest in caring for nature. We day dreamed about what kind of wildlife we would be able to enjoy if only the river were clean.

The next thing we came across was a group of oxen being herded by a young man and his father. They were quite large and ranged in age and size.

We rode for at least half an hour.

The road was easy, with just a bit of an incline to keep us peddling.

Soon we were ready for a shady spot to rest under, yet there were no good trees handy. We were getting quite tired when we began to hear the sound of a motor. It turned out that there were men working in the fields mowing down cornstocks. We stopped our bikes to get a better look at how the mower would chop up the stalks and then shoot the bits out a spout towards a trailer that quickly became loaded. A man was up top making sure to distribute the chips with a pitchfork.

After a few minutes of rest we decided to go ahead and see what was over the next hill.

Just that last hill, then we would turn back.

On our way, we came across these markings on the ground. Just a few meters away we saw another man working out in his field, but this time without a tractor. It was just him and a two wheeled wagon. He was loading what looked to be hay or alfalfa on the wagon. His horse was just to the side of the field taking rest in the shade of some bush overtaken with honeysuckle. The horse's hideout looked refreshing, and we were tempted to find our own low shade, but the thought of unknown inhabitants of the bushes kept us at bay.

Our fears were confirmed when we spotted these two roadkill snakes.

We had yet to make it up that last hill, so we plugged on. The peddling seemed to get more and more difficult, but as we reached top we were overjoyed at our discovery. A little village was just a stone's throw away, and the thought of a "tiendita"with a cold coke gave us renewed energy to press on.

We found a nice spot under a tree next to one of the first adobe houses where we stopped to cool off. Just as we were about to sit down, a little old lady opened her door to reveal a refrigerator full of softdrinks and shelves of packaged cookies! We were quick to ask for a coke and doubledly blessed to find it extremely cold, to the point of being slushy!

We were so glad that our curiosity to see what was over 'that last hill' had brought us such refreshment.