Walking on the Path

This morning, I went for one of the "Walktober" walks, a series of dozens of themed walks in the Eastern Connecticut area, sponsored by "The Last Green Valley" organization. The designation was given because our rural stretch of Connecticut and some of Massachusetts is the last mostly undeveloped area in the corridor between Washington DC and Boston. From space, it's the only mostly dark area at night.

Anyway, this morning I walked a portion of the "Connecticut Path", which was the main road between Boston and Hartford in the 1600s and early 1700s. The early settlers followed an Indian trail, gradually widening and improving it for carts and horses, although it was a simple walking trail at first. Some of it now is paved (parts of Route 44), some of it is still dirt roads, some of it is overgrown and forgotten.

It was fascinating to me to consider how many people over the centuries had trod that same ground. Part of the trail we walked was also the main road between Woodstock and West Woodstock, and the very religious West Woodstockers had petitioned the government for many, many years before they were allowed to have their own church, so they wouldn't have to make that long walk to the Woodstock Church every Sunday. This was one reason why Connecticut has 169 towns, some big, some small - it was so difficult to get from one place to another back in the day.

It was a beautiful fall day today. We are not seeing much foliage color yet, although it is almost the middle of October. I guess because September was so wet and rainy, and it's still quite warm. We need a few crisp autumn days to pull the color out, but it may be too late. We'll have to accept that brown is a color too.

I just got my developed pictures back, from the trip to Greece and Turkey. I have them on disk and also in the computer, but I like to see hard copies as well. As soon as I get more organized, I'll start posting, beginning with Athens.