Mt. Bonnell

Today we visited an old favorite, Mt. Bonnell. The last time we were at Mt. Bonnell was about 10 years ago. Toby and I had remembered the steps up to the stop as being strenuous and long. We were surprised this time, they were a lot shorter than we remembered them to be, and our breath was intact by the time we got to the top. Toby even ran up them. We must have been in really bad physical shape back then. Moving to Austin and keeping active most likely extended our lives....

The top....

The views were beautiful, although a little more overgrown that what we remembered. The day was cloudy and very humid, so my pics probably aren't the best.....

We also explored some little trails at the top....

Next, we headed down to Mayfield Park and Preserve. The peacocks weren't very cooperative, but we did get a few pics of them...

The Mayfield house...

They were doing some maintenance, so we headed to the trails behind the park...

We came upon this boat house. I could live like this...on the water in a small room above a boat house. Such a simple life. It made me homesick for a place I use to live in Alabama called Bayou Sara. Me and my ex were always out in the boat exploring the water ways. This place reminded me a lot of Bayou Sara...

We heard water falling, and it sounded like a large water fall, but when we got to it, it was small...

It was such a humid day, we probably would have dove in if we had found a place to swim. So we just cooled off with a nice beverage afterwards...

Later on in the evening, me and Skye sat out at the pool and watched the sun set. I'm relishing these evening sunsets, because I know before long I'll be in hibernation mode.

At one time, you could see the full sky line, but now the trees have grown so much they are taking away our view of the city lights....

Even the animals enjoy hanging outside with us in the evenings....

We have a couple of bats that stay behind for the winter. They like to come drink out of the pool at dusk. I'm thinking they must live in the tunnel close by. We also saw some lightening bugs out last night, which I thought was very unusual for this time of year. Oh yes, and the mosquitoes.

Southern Swimming

I'm not really sure what Toby and I have been doing for the past few weeks, but apparently it wasn't anything blog worthy, mostly our usual stuff, running errands and date days/nights with our couple friends.

As I anticipated Skye and her girlfriend broke up...not Skye's idea as I anticipated, also. Luckily, she has kept busy healing her wounds by hanging out with friends shopping, movies and Jumpoline.

We also had a mom and daughter day that was pretty fun...Halloween stores, eating lunch, shopping and a movie. It was a pleasant day.

Today we planned on a bike ride, but after our sweaty morning walk, I decided it was more of a swimming kind of day, so we headed to Barton Creek Greenbelt.

The outdoors is the only thing that brings me true joy and contentment. I'm happiest and most content when I'm out in nature or even sitting in my backyard watching sunsets or the night sky.

We started out at the Zilker Park trail head....

The water felt so good, as I had worked up a good sweat after a mile or two...

After the recent rains, it was nice to see the creek flowing....

With the recent rains, we were a little cautious walking under the cliffs....

When we got to Gus Fruh, we were excited to see there was actually water there! It would be our second time in the eleven years we've lived here that we've seen it not bone dry. The first time was in the winter months, so we weren't able to swim in it...

 

 The water felt really good, not too cold, but probably because we had worked up a good sweat. I love living in the South, a place where you can still swim in the fall....

After our swim we headed back on the three mile hike back to our car. In total, we hiked about six miles...

This little guy was enjoying a snack....

I'm really looking forward to the cooler temps, and getting out hiking/biking again.

Here are some other random shot from over the past few weeks...

 

Beautiful dark clouds on a morning walk...