The Adventures of Three Hobbits

After some delicious chocolate pancakes at Andrew's house and some *quality* time between Annie and Andrew's cat Bing (named after the singer, not the search engine,) we got back on the road and headed up toward Wisconsin. As a side note, I love this picture because it so encapsulates Annie's relationship with most dogs and cats. She doesn't hurt them, but they freak out around her. She's totally oblivious, though, and just loves them. It's the worst case of unrequited love ever.

The traffic around Chicago was pretty nasty, and the only down side of the route we took. At one point traffic really slowed down because a semi-trailer had run into a large microwave tower and knocked it right along the interstate. Oops.

Around supper time we arrived at Wildcat Mountain State Park, where we had an appointment with a large stand of hemlock trees. Annie was happy both to get out of the car and to have a big picnic dinner.

We thought this was a good sign, in both senses of the word. Hemlock trail wound its way up Mt. Pisgah, in and out of sandstone bluffs along the Kickapoo River. That is a very fun name to say, especially after... never mind.

This was also Annie's first hemlock hunting trip outside of the womb. She did really well, riding on my back in the Ergo pack for the two or so hours it took to collect needles and data from twenty sample trees.

The forest had some really gorgeous virgin forest.

After we were done collecting our samples we took a short break for Collin to finish writing his notes.

Here's the table for notes we take on the trees. We have to note the sample tree circumference, exact GPS coordinates, and any notes about the tree or stand. Generally I'm the note taker, and Collin's the data and needle collector.

Meet Annie, the Adventuress. Don't cross her, she's armed with sticks!

These bluffs are really gorgeous. We'd love to go back another time.