first day hike

Last year, to kick off the state parks project, we tried to do a first day hike, but everywhere we went, we ran into (literal) roadblocks. There had been a big storm a few days before, and every park we went to was closed because of flooding and/or downed trees. This year was much better, though. We went back to our old favorite, Potato Creek, this morning. It was cold enough that the ground was frozen, which was great because otherwise it would have been really muddy, but warm enough that we were all comfortable in sweatshirts. We checked on the beaver dam (not much going on there this time of year), and listened to the birds calling, though the only ones we got pictures of were black-capped chickadees. We found lots of birds' nests in the lower shrubbery, and Henry found some deer tracks that were preserved in the frozen ground. A pretty great way to kick off the year!