My Day-Off Hike

Living in Newport, RI, hikes on my days off can be interesting. It's typical rocky, hilly New England here, but we're also on the Atlantic Ocean and so have beaches, tidal inlets, salt marshes, and all. My favorite hike is down to the south end of town, where I pass through a  park with wooded trails and an old, long-unused and overgrown quarry, a tidal inlet/salt marsh  complex, and some meadows that serve as an absolute Woolworth's lunch counter for hawks, mostly Red-Tails.  I consider this area of Newport, especially the Gooseneck Cove area, to be my spiritual home.

First I have to walk through town, though. One of the places I walk by is an old colonial-era graveyard called the Clifton Burying Ground, which has to be the coziest graveyard I've ever seen. The backyard gardens of two streets abut on the graveyard and almost make it part of all those peoples' yards, not to mention all the flowers spilling into it. The shot to the left is of some daffodils blooming under an ornamental Cherry (which hasn't bloomed yet; still too early for us up here in chilly New England), and coincidentally in front of some stones from about the 1750s.

After some walking we get to Ballard Park. This includes two old, used up quarries (the stone used to build some of the older buildings in the area), one of which is the centerpiece of the park, with a tree-lined pond and a nice meadow on the old floor that is often used for concerts, etc. This meadow also has a lone Oak tree in the middle which I like to come and make contact with at least once a week. Yup, I'm a tree-hugger. The park also consists of trail through the woods surrounding the quarry, and it was on one of those trails that I was stalking a male Eastern Towhee (he eluded me very successfully) when the male Cardinal to the left proceeded to scold me in that high, short "chip, chip, chip" that they use as a warning sound. Heh, heh! I might not have gotten a shot of that Towhee, but the Cardinal certainly set himself up for a good portrait!

Out of the park and turn south on Hazard Rd. and we get to the salt marsh and Gooseneck Cove. Hazard Rd. flood in two places; the lower place is permanently flooded, and that sign that says "Not a through road" at the top really means it. The upper area floods at really high tides and when there's been a lot of rain, like the nor'easter we got a little over a week ago. Today I was there not too long after low tide, so the upper area was high and dry.

Gooseneck Cove is a treasure trove for birders. In the Spring and Summer the reeds are full of Carolina Wrens, Redwinged Blackbirds, Goldfinches, Swallows (mostly Barn and Tree), and a variety of Warblers, while the Cove itself gets Great Egrets, Snowy Egrets, Glossy Ibises, Ospreys, Common Terns, Cormorants, Green Herons, and occasional large Yellowleg Sandpipers. In the Fall and Winter there are a wide variety of ducks: the ubiquitous Mallards, and Pintails, Green and Blue Winged Teal, Buffleheads, Hooded Mergansers and Red-Fronted Mergansers. And all year long there are Great Blue Herons, Canada Geese, and Chickadees. you can see why I like to hang out in the place.

Today a buddy of mine had been there about an hour before and had spread some cracked corn for the Canada Geese. When I got there there was a Great Egret watching over the feeding Geese. That's him to the left. Yes, it is a he; that green stripe above his beak is his mating signal.

A little further down Hazard Rd. there's a spot that gets a bit wooded, mostly Scrub Oaks, Sumacs, Roses and other assorted briars, and up on the rockier hills there are Red Cedars. Lots of birds gather in this part: Chickadees, Tufted Titmice, Goldfinches, Yellow Warblers, and 20 varieties of Sparrow. And Crows. Now I have a special relationship with Crows; they seem to like hanging out with me, and we talk to each other. They chatter at me and when I talk back to them they actually seem to be listening. One even got playful with me a couple of years ago and played Keep Away with a twig with me, hopping around me and daring me to try to take the twig away, and when I got close he hopped onto a branch overhead and laughed his ass off at me. Then he hopped down and started all over again. Obviously Crows have adopted me, and so I've accepted Crow as one of my totems. (Hawk is my other totem, but I didn't get any good Hawk shots today.) This fellow on the left held converse with me this morning.  

Down Hazard Rd. we go, taking the path through the reeds around the permanently flooded part, then we turn west onto Ocean Drive and head for the Green Bridge, where the Drive passes over Gooseneck Cove. On the way there's a meadow on the right ringed with old trees. A couple of years ago a younf Red-Tailed Haek sat in one of the dead trees and posed for me for about 15 minutes before getting bored and flying away. Today one of the trees was full of a flock of noisy Cedar Waxwings. The little feller on the left was the only one who sat still enough and actually emerged from the tangle of branches enough to yield a couple of good shots. This is the best of the pair. 

At the Green Bridge I usually turn aside and hike up a trail up the east shore of Gooseneck Cove to eat my lunch on an old dam up there. This dam was built by the Army Corps of Engineers in 1942. I think it was part of a flood control project. It doesn't seem to have worked; Hazard Rd. is a flooded mess. And it seems to have proved to be harmful - it restricts the tidal flow, keeps far more fresh water in places that should have more salt, and thus produces algae blooms and other things not conducive to salt marshes. So later this year or early next year the dam is coming down and they'll be putting larger culverts under the Green Bridge to let the tide flow more freely. Hazard Rd. will still flood, but at least the Cove will be healthier. And I'll lose my lunch spot, but you'll be able to kayak all the way up the Cove without having to haul it over that blasted dam. And that's me to the left on my lunch break. 

After lunch we continue west on Ocean Drive to Brenton Rd., up Brenton to Hammersmith Rd., and up Hammersmith to Beacon Hill Rd., which winds around south of the unused meadows of the Swiss Village Farm, a foundation that preserves and breeds heritage farm animal breeds. including Llamas and Alpacas. But these meadows south of the main farm sit there and provide nutrtion for lots of native little ctitters and birds. the meadows are also dotted with and surrounded by trees, and this provised a lunch counter for Hawks. Today I watched two Red-Tails cruising by, but they didn't get close enough to get a good shot. One of them did let loose with that characteristic kee-errrrr, and I can't begin to tell you how that cry makes my entire week! There were also two Turkey Vultures cruising overhead, and I managed to get at least a marginal shot of one of them, there on the left.

Up Beacon Hill Rd., and today I head east over to the north end of Brenton Rd. Sometimes I head up Harrison Ave. because there are often interesting flowers growing on the stone or brick walls that face the road, but today something told me to head right instead. And sure enough, there were a bunch of of Brown-Headed Cowbirds on a wide lawn there. This one to the left was herding two females, and I wish he hadn't been pushing them so hard so that they would've been closer together and I could've gotten al three in the shot. Oh well, in photography you often have to take what you can get. 

And that's today's hike. I hope you've enjoyed it as much as I did!