Trek 4500 Part II, Manic Mushrooms, Jagged Edge

... got 'Muscle Girl Sarah' out on the trails last weekend - had planned on nothing intense, just a short trip out across the ridge and up to the local 'lookout point' and back - but a usual that plan quickly faded... we made short time in reaching the 'overlook' and by this time she has figured out her shifting patterns and along with 'Z-Man' is amped to move on to better stuff - we got a whole afternoon yet ahead, so decided to continue along the ridge loop which includes some steep hill climbing on now mostly very loose rocky terrain thanks to the recent dry weather combined with the multitude of four wheelers, dirt bikers, quads, side by sides and dune buggys that frequent the area...

... a short stream crossing thru 'Laurel Run'...

... didn't take many photos as we cranked along at a steady pace other than a few bit too frequent short breaks on my part to recover from some out-of-shape conditioning... all told we covered around 9.5 miles with around 650ft elevation gain - for the first time out Sarah performed like she was born for this stuff with a pretty strong performance - personally was gulpin' air a few times trying to keep pace - she surprised as well on the final downhill which drops a very rocky and technical 450ft in a little over 1/2 mile...

... back at the vehicles totin' a bit of trail dirt and mud... good job...

... noticed loads of 'Aminita Muscaria' popping up this season - that's a typical 'red cap' pictured above, the cap yet to spread out - at least we're pretty sure that they're 'Aminitas' - not an expert and always gotta' go back and pull out the mushroom book for identification...

... here;s a few of the white capped 'Alba' variety we photographed the same day growing on the lawn back at the 'Sanctum Santorum'...

... not yet "capped out"...

... same mushroom the next day - remember that these are the psychotic 'Berserker Mushrooms' that the Vikings would eat to prep for some intense pillage and destruction (see 'Magic Mushrooms')...

... Uh-OH!... it's 'Ig the Cat'... what's he up to?...

... "Get away from those things!!"...

... too late...

... didn't see him for a few hours afterward, so decided to take a stroll around the neighborhood to make sure he wasn't flattened road-kill somewhere... never found 'em but he was settin' on the front porch when we returned - appeared as normal as usual...

... thought it was strange, though, that all the neighborhood dogs had been hangin' out in the trees - never saw that before...

.................................

... 'Jagged Edge'...

... 'Mauch Chunk' sandstone, 15"x7"x1", around 10lbs...