Those gnarly old tree roots just didn’t look as good this time.

When I’d last stopped by this old beaver pond back in December of last year it had been frozen over and the roots were casting long and kinda spooky shadows on the snow. Now, while still very nice, they were, I dunno, kinda bland.

But the day itself, fortunately, was far from bland.

I’d headed out a bit after sunrise — which is happening later and later these days — and rolled north and west into the hills around Cremona and Sundre. The morning was bright and calm, a bit cool but pleasant, the morning sun bright and highlighting the foliage along the road and making it glow. And it especially glowed by a little spring-fed pond near Bergen.

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The clear water was burbling, little gnats were spinning around, the leaves were backlit and bright. Aspens and poplars, wispy grass and stiff sedges all caught the sun and glowed against the shadowed background. The pond’s surface sparkled where tiny currents kicked the light around.

This was another place that I’ve visited in the winter and it is just as pretty then, the bare branches where these bright green leaves are now, covered with spiky frost crystals and the water, never freezing because of the relative warmth it carries up from the ground, topped by a thin layer of silvery mist. Such a lovely place. I love to revisit it.

From there I continued west across Fallen Timber Creek and up to a tall ridge that overlooks the Red Deer River valley just to the north. Last December I could see over to Sundre across the snowy fields but today a soft haze limited the view. A bit of smoke, maybe? Or just a light morning mist. Anyway, no views.

So I continued on, following the contour of the ridge and angling back southward along roughly the same route as I had back in December. The fields and forests were lush with late-summer growth and the roadsides full of magenta-blossomed thistles and red rose hips, some nearly as big as crab apples. Asters were everywhere.

The roads I was on were the same as those from last winter but now that they weren’t snow-covered, I pushed on a little farther than I had before. And I found some new country.

I often brag there isn’t a road in southern Alberta I haven’t been on but though that’s not far from the truth, there are a few I haven’t explored completely. This road I found myself on was one of them and it led me down into the Nitchi Creek valley.

The creek itself is tiny but it runs through a valley........

© Calgary Herald