September marked five years married to Dan. <3 We did something we’ve been dreaming about from before that, though–and got a cabin in the backwoods at Starved Rock for a little getaway. Hint: it was glorious.
It was also the PERFECT time for it because we’ve had a lot of rain. And it did rain on us a bit the first day, but the second and third and fourth day was 10/10.
Dan got me into birding, too. And I found some incredible/rare birds, including the rare Northern saw-whet owl.
The Nuthatch and the Tufted Titmouse are BOTH so beautiful. Couldn’t take my eyes off of them, fluttering around in the trees. It’s been several weeks since we got back, and I now own a pair of binoculars and use birds as a calming thought for my brain-spotting sessions.
Our house is in the PERFECT spot for this hobby because we can walk through OUR forest and turn left and come out on a forest reserve path. Basically, the reserve is our backyard. LOL! And there’s nobody else living around us, really. No neighbors (that you can really see) so it feels so secluded. I call our forest the Wood Between the Worlds.
Anyway, back to Starved Rock.
This is the IL River, which runs right by Starved Rock.
PDA Alert. Keep scrolling if it’s too damn much for ya’
Yeah, I oversaturated this one because it looks like a fairytale. Complaints are welcome in the comments and free coffee to the person who knows exactly how much I turned up the saturation.
SO MANY STAIRS.
You can’t see it in the photo, but it’s almost 400 stairs from here to the bottom by the Illinois River. We heard all kinds of woodpeckers, robins, cardinals, chickadees, towhees, wrens and flickers here. Also sparrows. And house finches.
CTMSPFB- (compliments to make single people feel bad/show off my good-looking dude/pretend there was any reason to do this besides feeling like we’re cute) It was freezing but it was so, so pretty. But still not as good-looking as this dude’s face.
Oversaturation is a gift from the gods, okay? Okay, but truly with photos it feels as if either the picture is dull and all the color is washed out or it’s oversaturated. **shrug**
Illinois River, different angle. Not oversaturated! (you’re welcome.)
“And on our trip to Yosemite, we saw…a pine tree. Another pine tree. A pine tree. Another pine tree. An oak tree. Another pine tree…”
Anyway, yep. that was it. LOL!
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