The Ice Trail + Area in Autumn September 30, 2024

 The Ice Trail donned in autumn hues with an added touch of frostiness!

Today was my second try at enjoying a loop walk around Bowness, Baker and Bowmont Parks.  My plan to do this the other day was thwarted when on the drive out of my neighbourhood, my tire picked up a roofing nail.  It was smooth sailing today and I arrived to beautiful sights with a crispy coolness in the air, enough so that gloves and hat were necessary accessories.  First on my agenda was to check out the locations where I skate in winter.  

This is The Canal! 

This is The Lagoon!

This is The Ice Trail!

These Parks are perfect places to witness the shades of autumn!  

An added bonus was the clouds continued to put on a performance.  

The framing opportunities were plentiful!  

It's Baker Park where you will find Siberian Larch Trees!  The Larches along this section ranged in colour from some still sporting green to others being prime and yet others were some where in between. 

This is a close up view of a Siberian Larch Tree.  

I would never even attempt to paint one of these!

The clouds dissipated by the time I arrived at Bowmont Park 

yet the colours carried on and now reflections added to the views. 

view looking back down at the pond

beautiful tree-lined trail

The above photos show just a fraction of the beauty I captured.  These parks were the perfect place to be to say good-bye to September.  By the time I arrived back at my vehicle, I had covered just over ten kilometres.  This brings me to 1911 kms covered to date this year.  My goal was to cover 2024 kms by the end of the year but I now hope to do that by mid October.  

🖌🖌🖌🖌🖌🖌

I snapped this shot of a female Mallard Duck on my most recent visit to Carburn Park.  While I have taken many photos of mallards, for some reason this one appealed to my senses.  I kept looking at it wondering could I do a watercolour painting of it! I tried but failed! I tried again, ugh! I wanted the painting to include  the duck, the water and the leaves but no luck!  Then I had a thought, just paint the dam duck anyway!

This is my watercolour painting of the female Mallard Duck!

To fill my need to paint leaves, this is what I came up with!  

A freehand willy nilly whimsical masterpiece!!!