Rediscovering Jenks Creek

 



Today was our trail club's regular monthly hike. We just managed to sneak it in before gun deer season which starts tomorrow. Most hikers choose to leave the woods to the hunters for those weeks. Too many accidents happen.

But after the group broke up, I chose to hike an extra two miles. This is a section of trail that I've hiked at least 3 other times. But I had completely forgotten how it follows the lovely little Jenks Creek here. Most people don't even know it's there at all. See the road crossing? Just a guardrail. Modern road building certainly makes it easy for travelers to be completely unaware of landscape features, especially small ones like creeks.



Following the trail, there are places where you can get a clear view of the creek. It may be more noticeable in the woods this fall because we had such a wet October and has flowing water. Here it looks like a definite stream bed, but in many places it is braided and becomes swampy in its small floodplain.



This is a very typical look at the creek bed. There was actually quite a bit of motion to the water. I always like how the tape grass seems to flow like green water in the current. The streams in these woods look so brown because of all the tannins from the oak leaves.



You know that I just find textures and patterns fascinating. So the final three pictures are just sunlight on the water at various places along the stream.



Any little trickle of water can become a wonderful palette for the impressionistic brush of sun and shadow.



I hope you enjoyed the little journey along Jenks Creek with me. This afternoon, thanks to the clearing reported yesterday, I mowed all my trails in back of my house, getting them ready for snow. The skiing is much better when I get the weeds and berry canes cleared. It was hard to think about snow under the blue skies today, but it IS mid-November!

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