Jug Bay

Took a walk at Jug Bay today, one of our favorite spots because there are always lots of critters and mushrooms to look at.

Along the boardwalk on the edge of the marsh we saw five different snakes jump out of the trees and slither away when we walked by. 

We spent quite a while watching this turtle -- imagine our surprise when it started devouring a mushroom! 

Drag Race

Last night was the annual high heel race in front of our building on 17th Street -- these were some of this year's contestants.

Sunrise

Woke up to a beautiful sunrise today.

Bird Knob

Sunday night we camped by a little pond on Massanutten Mountain. A highlight was seeing a little black bear cub in the clearing below Bird Knob -- it scampered away when it saw us. The low was the low -- it got cold! There was frost just above where we were camping.

A view of the lake from our campsite.

We nibbled on lots of wild grapes.

E on a hovering rock at the overlook

Pale corydalis near the top of Bird Knob 

Metamorphosis

A few weeks ago we brought home three black swallowtail caterpillars from our garden. We've been watching them transform ever since, and today one hatched from its chrysalis. It has been a real gift to be able to watch this process up close.

September 17. We went to check on our carrots in the garden and found them infested with caterpillars. They change markings as they grow -- see how the biggest one has different stripes?

September 22. What a difference a few days (and a lot of parsley) makes!

September 24. When they're eating and growing, caterpillars are perfectly happy to stay in one place as long as you keep bringing them new food. But when it's time to start making a chrysalis, they like to wander. Today one of our caterpillars spent hours crawling around its box. It finally decided the screen on top was where it wanted to hunker down. It spun silk to hold itself in place. Several hours later the caterpillar shed its last skin, leaving this chrysalis.

October 5. When we woke up, this butterfly had emerged from its chrysalis.

Amazing.

October 7. This is the female that emerged today -- her markings have more blue and less yellow than the male.

New Hampshire

We took a trip up to New Hampshire with Elizabeth's parents to see the leaves changing and to watch her dad run the Bristol, NH Marathon (he has now run a marathon in 47 states!).

Matt on top of Zealand Falls

A pond along the Kancamagus Highway