no more gravel pit :(

Reinee was straining at the leash and I was straining to see field marks on some cute little blue-backed birds (glasses left at home), so I didn't notice the barrier until we were right on top of it. Several old culverts and some dirt and large rocks were piled across the road, blocking our way at the end of Main Street, keeping us from the dirt road that leads down past the gravel works. This was accompanied by a huge sign that says "NO TRESPASSING".

I was in shock for a while. Then, hoping that the barrier was meant for trucks and such, I released Reinee and we walked along the edge of the high ground to a place where I knew people enter the area on foot. There I met another pile of dirt blocking the road and supporting an old plank which bore two smaller signs: "Keep Out" and "No Trespassing". I leashed Reinee up and we trudged home along the narrow verge, dodging the traffic on Highway 17.

No more place for young people to climb and run, no more place for people to ride their horses and run their dogs, no more place for trucks and ORV's to scramble up a variety of steep hills and humps. And no more time for me to take photographs. I had thought I would have forever to take shots of the interesting scenes that met my eyes at the gravel pit. I had a dozen or more vantage points picked out from which to take these shots. I was waiting for warmer weather, when we'd be taking our walks in the early morning, long shadows adding to the view. One lovely hollow would have made an interesting time-lapse study, with a series of stitched panoramics journaling its spring greening. I had just taken the first of those groups of pictures.

I saw in the police notices in The Spectrum a few days ago that there was a theft at the gravel pit. I wondered if someone had gotten into the office trailer and stolen the petty cash. I'm beginning to think it was a lot more serious than that.