This morning I took a walk in the Bosque (pronounced, "bas-kay") which is the green area on either side of the Rio Grande river. Bosque means "forest," but it's not at all like a New England or Adirondack forest. The largest trees are cottonwoods, and there's lots of scrubby, brushy, shrubby stuff and sand. For parts of the path, it's like walking by the ocean where the sand is deep and fine and your feet slide backward with each step and your shoes slowly fill with sand. Other parts of the trail are more solid, but all is sandy.
Since ABQ is a big city, you can pretty much always hear traffic and airplanes. The traffic noise was minimal in the part of the Bosque I visited, and I could hear something I've been missing since I got here -- birds! When we hiked in the mountains and the desert, the sound of birds was conspicuously absent. I could hear songbirds, a woodpecker, and a small flock of Canada geese passing overhead. When I returned to the visitor's center, I checked that last part with the volunteer at the desk, because although they sure sounded like Canada geese to me, I didn't actually see them and I didn't know they frequented this area. She assured me that was what I heard.
The Rio Grande is, I am told, higher in the spring, and is suffering from the drought. Still, I didn't find it very grand. I'm pretty sure I could have waded across without getting my shorts wet.
It's muddy, and it smells kind of muddy and funky. Farther along the trail, the path narrowed and I was brushing up against a lot of sagebrush, so sage was the dominant fragrance, which was lovely. The scenery didn't vary much, but it was a nice walk.
On my way out, I got this nifty photo of a roadrunner sitting on the trail marker by the visitor's center!
Great shot of the road-runner . . . beep-beep!
ReplyDeleteSince I moved out west, I have come to associate the smell of cottonwoods with springtime in the west - it's on my list of favorite smells!