Thursday, September 10, 2009

Another tramp through the woods...

The Road Not Taken
.
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;
.
Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same, 
.
And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back. 
.
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.
.
~ Robert Frost
Michelle and I went for a hike in the mountains and woods west of Sedalia, Colorado, on Sunday afternoon.  It's a long story, but the plan was to find a fire watch tower we'd read about.  We started out on the wrong path to begin with, though, and then we came to a fork in the trail. We took the one less traveled, and this is what we found:
Rocks, rocks everywhere.  Boulders, big and small -- of all shapes and sizes and man-size boulders, like this one, balancing on the edge of mountain-size boulders.
Lots of funny mushroom shaped rocks like this one (above).

Can you see the face in this one? 
( There were definitely trolls in these woods.)
 
Lots of fun, relatively safe boulders to climb.
These boulders arranged like Stonehenge reminded us of what happened to Bilbo's Trolls in The Hobbit.

After a bit, we hiked our way around a large stone outcropping...
....
.... and found the coolest cave!
Then we climbed onto some boulders near the cave and looked out across the ravine to the craggy mountainside -- the path more traveled where we were originally going to go.
And we looked down around our feet and found some first signs of fall.
On turning back, we saw the back of the large rock formation, over the cave.
Do you see what we saw?
We thought he looked like an Easter Island fellow (the guy from Night at the Museum, Dumdum, who likes gumgum), a Henson Muppet, or just another rock troll that lives in these enchanted woods.

The views, grand and tiny, were spectacular.  We had a wonderful time, and were grateful we'd taken the trail less traveled.  It was a glorious, slow, meandering day.  I'm thankful for all the chances God provides for me to slow down, and to enjoy His beautiful  creations -- particularly the wonderful gift of my first-born daughter.

6 comments:

Diana said...

Oh Lisa I loved this. How perfect a reward when taking the road less traveled. Your pictures were amazing and I did see the face. And the one rock did look like the Easter Island fellow! The cave was really cool, you can't tell that I love places like that can you? Great post and your Michelle is lovely!
Love Di

Unknown said...

OH WOW! I saw faces in almost all the boulders! HOW AMAZING! that was a perfect picture day and the best pic of all was your beautiful daughter. Loved your post today! Aren't we blessed to have such beautiful daughters to share our world with! I know I AM!

MightyMom said...

wonderful!!

I wonder how those rocks got in those strange places and shapes!!

A Bit of the Blarney said...

Wow! what a grand adventure!!! The scenery is really grand!!! Cathy

Kim H. said...

Sometimes the road less travelled is the best kept secret of all.

And what a beautiful gift for the both of you -- time spent together!

You're such a good Mom!

Maria (also Bia) said...

what a beautiful hike . . . the rock formations, the cave, a lovely day with your daughter

i need to come hiking in Colordado!