Winter Farm Hike 1/8/2019
This is a delightful hike we always look forward to. We all owe Sandy a huge debt for hosting us again. THANK YOU!
Tuesday’s “Winter Farm Hike” turned out to be the polar opposite of what anyone would expect from the hike’s title. Only a poet would have the words to express the absolutely perfect day 32 Tuesday Groupers experienced throughout the hike.
However, since I am not a poet, and a picture is worth a thousand words anyway, please view the wonderful pictures taken that day by Bill Billings and Bob Mooney.
The donkeys and ponies shown in the pictures all are rescues from Diamonds in the Rough, an equine rescue center located in or around Suffolk, Virginia. The “fainting” goats also are rescues. Fainting goats are a domestic goat that temporarily “dies” when they panic or something startles them. The two at the farm probably are in the best home they’ve ever had, and thus, to my understanding, have never again been frightened enough to faint!!
I did notice neither Bill or Bob took any pictures during the ice cream social that followed the hike. I “kind of” suspect they were bribed by those not wanting pictures of large and larger servings!!!
Maybe another reason the entire hike was such a success comes from an old saying, i.e., a poor start is a good finish. About 45 minutes before everyone was to arrive, the hunt club’s power suddenly went off. Community Electric assured us they were working on the problem and would get the power back on as soon as possible. However, that did not help our initial panic about the gallons of ice cream, cream whip, etc, etc, already in the hunt club’s freezer not to count the large cuts of venison also left there by the hunters.
Thank goodness for the Andersons, the couple renting the farmhouse. Once again they took in some rescues, this time it was everything in the club’s freezer with the assurance it would be returned in time for our ice cream social. It was, and thus this “poor” start rolled over into the hike’s great farm walk-about in the New Year. HOO-AH!!
PS. If anyone can identify the two small pointed tracks in Bill’s pictures, it would be appreciated. They are shown right before the tracks of a deer are shown. They were not like any deer tracks I’ve seen unless it was a baby deer walking only on its toes. We thought it may be tracks of a pig or wild hog but a comparison of the two on the web appears to say otherwise. The hog’s tracks are more broad than what we saw.
View Bill's photos: https://www.flickr.com/gp/bbi/v4f4wh