"An Explore" at Clifton Gorge

After Brian's graduation, he had a few days off. Well deserved, I might add. My parent's were still here visiting and the weather wasn't too hot or humid so we decided to go on a little "explore". In case you're unfamiliar with what an "explore" is... ....you should get out more! Ha! Some people call it an "outing" or maybe even a "hike". We refuse to call it a "hike" because our Western minds only allow us to call it "hiking" if there is some sort of significant incline...man made bridges and walk ways do not count!
A simpler explanation would be this... We went on a walk in the woods and saw some interesting and pretty things.
However, our fam likes to put a twist on simple things. Thus, we call it "An Explore". If you know our family then that just makes perfect sense, doesn't it?
okay....blah, blah, blah, I'm done explaining my title, sorry, I'm writing Pre-Starbucks.
ANYWAY....
This area, Clifton Gorge, is a great place to go on a sunny, warm day. Most of the trails are nicely shaded and level. The trail runs right along the upper rim of the gorge and has several lookout points that let you see the water's edge. There is also another trail, that takes you down to the lower level of the gorge, but we didn't go on that this particular day.

As we looked out from this vantage point we were surprised to see a motorcycle down at the bottom of the gorge. Somebody had a bad day!
I don't know how long it had been there, we didn't remember it being there the last time. We had fun making up scenarios about how it would've gotten there. Nothing gruesome just some wild rides or rides off road to avoid hitting a deer.

It was a very fun time together. After all the trail walking, tree climbing, and rock collecting (aka: Titus filling his pockets with rocks when no one is looking), we fared the trip with only one scraped elbow and a squished spider.
The 3rd picture shows a place where a mill was located many, many years ago (1800's, I think). If you look closely you can see the imprint from where the support beams where in the rock.
This last picture was a fun one to take. I spotted this pretty flower from down the trail. As I set up my shot and zoomed in, AH! There was a spider on the flower!! It held nice and still until after I took its picture.
Others could learn a thing or two from this here spider. Emily, in particular. How interesting that it just so happens that Emily LOVES spiders! Really! I'm not even kidding, she really does. She just picked one up yesterday off the floor, alive! Well, at least it started out that way.
But that's another topic for another post... :)