A Family Adventure


Tyson, Emilie & Isaac

The Rocks, Bethlehem NH

October 31, 2021
Emilie Phillips

It rained the weekend we spent in the Whites. At first the forecast promised the rain would stop Sunday early morning, then Sunday mid morning. Finally it quit at lunch time. We downsized from a big hike to a small hike, to a walk. We picked The Rocks conservation area for our walk. It’s an old country manor with some interesting buildings. There was an old bee house decorated with carvings. The little kid play house could have been a poorer family’s primary residence. We should come back on NH maple weekend to visit the maple sugaring museum.

The Michael Gozzo trail follows an old road south from the visitor parking and up the hill across South Road. The middle part is unfortunately closed, but the rest of the trail looked good for skiing. We couldn’t decide if it was steep cross country or easy Telemark.

The area has numerous maintained wildlife clearings. In one of them, we found a short tree filled with bright red berries. The leaves were similar to maple leaves. Anyone know what it is? [Edit Jan 2022, Sarah told us these are highbush cranberry (Viburnum trilobum). Also the green bamboo looking grass stuff is horse tails — a prehistoric plant.]

The other oddity we spotted was a tiny aquatic worm thing. It was about the size and color of two pine needles put end to end. From shape and coloration, I couldn’t distinguish one end from the other. However, there was definitely one end it used to poke into the leaf litter and up to the surface, and the other end followed. Here is a video clip:

That evening Isaac and Tyson went trick or treating in Littleton with friends. Isaac came back thoroughly soaked but happy.

All Photos

GPS Tracks

First part of the hike

Second part of the hike

Written November 10, 2021, updated January 12, 2022

Discussion

3 comments already.

Let us know what you think

See the Comment Policy for appropriate content.

Notify me of followup comments via e-mail. You can also subscribe without commenting.

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Comments (3)

    • Maple leaf viburnum seems plausible. The leaves definitely match. The only thing that seems a little off in the online descriptions is that the viburnum berries start red and turn black when mature. These berries were very ripe and leaked red juice at the gentlest squeeze.

      Reply