Bluebells
Today's like is on another Mayo River State Park parcel, opened to the public for about a year now. The dead end dirt road has parking for about 8 vehicles if they are parked without social distancing. It appeared we passed a homesite on the drive in. there were small white daffodils - the late blooming variety. The parking lot had a clump as well but the real treat there were the Bluebells, above.
Pinxter
We hiked in on an old road, passing another homesite before getting to the Mayo in about 1/2 mile. Here there was a large community of Ragwort and Robin's Plantain in the flood plain.
We followed Hickory Creek for about 1/2 mile, seeing a large number of Pinxter Azaleas and a lovely encounter with a Scarlet Tanager. The rock features of the creek were quite attractive. We located an old ford across the creek.
Scarlet Tanager
Often heard but not easily seen, this Tanager was low, near the ground, silent and quite oblivious to our presence.
Once we had made our way up the creek to a stopping point, we retraced back to the Mayo. At the river, we followed it along river right. There was a tremendous amount of sand along this stretch.
Dwarf Ginseng
In this sandy areas, we encountered a quite large area of Dwarf ginseng and Foam Flower.
Maidenhair Ferns
Yellow Sorrel
Eventually, we turned left after crossing a small creek and headed up back to the road. There was a nice area of Showy Orchis here. Once on the road, we passed an old tobacco barn with a clump of Star of Bethlehem. The entire hike was about 3.5 miles and quite easy for an offtrail jaunt.
Star of Bethlehem
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