Instead of birding, today Laurie and I went up to Concord to capture photos of autumn there. It's no secret that Concord is my favorite town in MA. I haven't been up there this year just because I've done everything in town a dozen times. However, foliage season gave me a new challenge to photograph.
For reasons I don't understand, when I uploaded the photos to blogger they came up backwards. Meaning the first photo below was my last. I tried fixing it, but there must be a glitch in Blogger right now. So here I telling you about Concord in reverse order than I saw it.
When we got there it was still raining, but five minutes after pulling into Great Meadows parking lot the clouds were gone and the sky was bright blue. This wasn't all good because it meant dealing with harsh light and bad shadowing. I thought I'd have some time to photograph in cloudy conditions but never had a chance. Not that I am complaining. The temp rose to sixty degrees and it was a beautiful fall day.
This is the Paul Revere capture site below. He was caught by the British soldiers during his famous midnight ride at this spot.
This huge tree near the capture site was the object of many people's selfies and photos.
These kids were having a tough time trying to get up to the first branch, but they were having fun
This is Buchman Tavern. People were taking a peak inside since they can't go in anymore. Thanks Covid
After the initial conflict between the British and Minutemen there was a running battle all the way back to Boston Harbor where the British soldiers were stationed. They had another sixteen miles to go and they had already been up close to 24 hours
The Wayside House at points was a home of Louisa May Alcott and Nat Hawthorne
The Orchard House below. This is where Alcott wrote Little Woman
The photo below is of Brewster Spring. Henry David Thoreau used to bird watch here. One of the things I wanted to do was get a photo of a bird, any bird, from this spot knowing Thoreau was in the same spot a hundred and seventy years ago. This proved tougher than expected. There were a few birds but with all the trees, leaves, and sticks, my camera did not want to focus on any of them. We even saw a bald eagle soaring over the trees. Finally I got a couple bad photos of a hawk and a Tufted Titmouse, but mission accomplished.
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| Red Tailed Hawk photographed from Brewster Spring |
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| Tufted Titmouse |
We spent an hour walking around downtown. Most of Concord is very old. These diners were eating at "The Colonial" which is where we had my brother's bachelor party.
There were a lot of people early voting today. The line was socially distancing, but it would have been pretty long anyway
Most of the old buildings were decorated for fall
I don't know how old the home below is. It reminded me of a fairy tale house.
This brick building is the Concord Museum. It is home to one of the lantern of "one if by land, two if by sea" fame. Also, it houses Emerson's library and a bunch of other amazing historic artifacts.
A very Liberal Church in a very liberal town. Biden signs were everywhere. I never saw one Trump sign.
Side view of the above church
Laurie and I went to a play at this little theater once. Not my favorite play ever.
I liked this scene when I saw it. But I knew that light post was going to drive me crazy. But I chose to show it because I wanted to show the bright red tree in the photo. I really couldn't maneuver for a better angle. We were standing at the edge of a rotary and there was a lot of traffic. On the bright side the trees frame the church nicely. You win some, you lose some, I guess.
One of the first things we did was stop at the North Bridge. Incidentally, the bathrooms are open for public use.
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The Minuteman Statue by Daniel
Chester French who was only 23 at
the time! |
We stopped at Sleepy Hollow Cemetery which is the final resting place of Emerson, Alcott, Thoreau, Hawthorne, and French
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| Emerson |
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Alcott
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| Henry David Thoreau |
The very first thing we did was go to Great Meadows. I thought it would be lit up like a Christmas tree with fall colors. But it was surprisingly very dull. The four birders in the photo also said the birding was dull. I agreed. Other than some Great Blue Heron's and some flyover ducks, there wasn't anything around.
The Concord River. Much duller than I expected.
The only real color we found was this fading rainbow. Still, we had a nice day
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