art challenge: room (with a view)

Honeysuckle Tea House is a community gathering place, a musical performance space, a holistic living/learning center, a tea farm, a playground, an enormous garden full of medicinal and healthful herbs and flowers, a café, a tea house, and more. There are no windows and it only has half-walls so the whole space is open to wafting breezes.

It's a fabulous room with fabulous views.

 

 

 

Art Challenge is a project hosted this week by Nadine where artist bloggers from around the world are invited to interpret a pre-determined theme and create a post to share.

This week's theme is room.

on my morning stroll

Linking to Through My Lens - an International group where photographers are invited to share.

saturday in saxapahaw

During warm weather months, folks gather on a shady hillside in Saxapahaw to spend the evening listening to musicians perform. A farmer's market is set up, crafts people sell their wares, food trucks bring in munchies and families settle in for all kinds of fun.

 It's community at it's best.

 Jonathan Byrd and Johnny Waken...just awesome.

 

 Much bubble fun!

 

 Tree climbing, show watching fun!

 

 Families having fun!

Listen to "I am an Oak Tree" here. Jonathan Byrd and the Pickup Cowboys!

a hike through mason farm biological reserve

Some time during the 1740's, the Morgan family settled in southeastern Orange County, NC. (Morgan - as in Morgan Creek - for you James Taylor fans). In 1894, Mary Morgan Mason, one of the last descendants of the Morgan family, gifted the farm and it's property to the University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill. Much of the property has reverted back to woodlands now and parts of the forest are 150 years old and contains trees that are over 300 years old. Amazing. There's a 65 acre ancient forest that has been continuously forested (never plowed or clear-cut) since before European settlement. The old fields, open since before the Civil War, are being rehabilitated to their wet meadow and Piedmont prairie states. Mason farm is 367 acres, set aside for study, contemplation, appreciation and exploration. On this day we hiked through slowly, to listen, explore and enjoy. The only sound was birdsong, summer insect noise and the occasion deer bounding through the woods.

When you see a tree in the woods, bent awkwardly but purposefully like this, you know that you've come across on old native Indian trail.

It was mid-day when we arrived so the birds were hiding in the shady growth,

but the dragonflies were everywhere!

 

 

 

 

 

musica: music lovers, musicians, the scene

down by the river - hillsborough's river walk

Both the Eno and the Haw run through our area, along with hundreds of creeks and tributaries. No matter what town we're in, there is river access for hiking, sitting, swimming, kayaking, whatever your heart desires. Add to that the lakes and ponds and we are decidedly water rich and it's a perfect way to spend some time. On this day we headed to Hillsborough and hiked one of the Riverwalk trails.

You don't have to meander far along this trail before coming upon Patrick Doughterty's Stickwork installation. It's a one-of-a-kind bent sapling sculpture that was commissioned by the Hillsborough Arts Council. Five towers and one central tower, all created using elm, sweetgum and sugar maple, complete with windows and an oculus in the central ceiling so visitors an view nature from within the framed observatory.

 

Then down to the river, to sit on the huge rock outcroppings.

The river winds it's way under an old train trestle,

giving hikers a rare view of the underside, footings, etc.

 

Riverwalk is a part of NC's Mountain-to-Sea Trail but is an easy walkabout for those of us who want to spend a day in the woods or an afternoon on the river.