Blue Marsh Lake Loop Trail to Fox Trot Trail

Another day with (mostly) good weather, so out we went.  Any excuse for a hike.

We're running out of Appalachian Trail sections within less than an hour's drive of our campground, so we returned to a hike at Blue Marsh National Recreation Area, which offers 30 miles of hiking on the lake's loop trail.  We've hiked two other sections, but for today we chose a section from Highway 183 to the Fox Trot Loop Trail -- a little over 6 miles round trip.

Here we are at the trailhead.  For some reason, the loop trail here is signed as the "Mt. Pleasant Trails," but we can assure you that you will see us hiking around the lake.

Spring has sprung, and, as our good friend Jo Lassiter has often said, the grass is riz.  But so are the wildflowers, and these buttercup-type flowers bloomed all along our trail:

There were also sections of the trail where beautiful white blossoms graced each side:

In the space of a week or so, this area has suddenly become lush with spring greens.  If you don't believe us, take a look at this video of all the new greenery Spring surprised us with on this hike.

We continued along the lakeshore, and then turned away from it and upland into a wide swath of farm fields:

Eventually, our trail through the fields turned back toward the lake, and we spotted this wonderful birdhouse -- one of two on a small arm of the lake:

If you recall, Blue Marsh Lake was formed by flooding a valley of Tulpehocken Creek.  In the process, many homes and properties were submerged.  It's easy to forget, however, that there were roads through this area.  In cutting the hiking trails through the recreation area, the U.S. Corps of Engineers paid homage to the old roads by noting where the hiking trails follow old roads.  This section of our hike was named, "Cornered House Road."  We wondered what a cornered house might be and where we could find it:

More beautiful wildflowers that graced our path:

About two miles into our hike, we came across this point with an excellent view of this section of Blue Marsh Lake.  We decided this should be our lunch spot, and resolved that we would finish the first leg of our hike to our turnaround spot, and then hike back here to eat our lunch:

The recent rains have made sections of the trail muddy, and have livened up the little drainages and brooks in the area.  This freshet over which our trail's bridge crossed was quite fetching:

Soon, we reached a junction with Fox Trot Trail, which led on to a day used area.  We preferred to turn around at the 3-mile mark rather than get too close to the day use area, because, in this age of Coronavirus, it would be best to avoid other hikers.  Nevertheless, Fox Trot Trail, as it turned up toward the day use area, revealed itself as an old road (complete with yellow centerline) that was truncated by the flooded lake, but nevertheless retained some romantic allure as it climbed the rise:

Near the junction with Fox Trot Trail, we also happened on a side trail to a little fishing spot on the bank of the lake, which we found very pretty:

Reaching our turnaround, we...turned around...and started hiking back.  Another mile and we reached our lunch spot.  When we arrived, we spotted these two doughty fishermen in a little boat below the point on which we sat.  We sneaked this photo:

As we packed up after lunch to continue back to our trailhead, we heard a yell of joy from one of the fishermen and supposed that he had caught a fish.  Indeed, as we walked back onto the trail, we peered down and he was already cleaning his catch.  We were glad for him and remembered those glory days of catching fat, big pink-meated trout in the mountain lakes of Alaska while all the locals were chasing salmon in the Copper River.  Oh, those were the days.

Still, these are also the days, my friend.  We hope they never end.  We'll sing and dance, forever and a day.  We'll live the life we choose.  We'll fight and never lose.  These are the days, my friend, these are the days.