Tastes of the Trail




One of the great side benefits of buckets full of Halloween candy laying around the house – and stowed up in the pantry out of reach of sugar-crazed kids – is that you can use some of those suckers (Dum Dums, Tootsie Pops), as bribes to entice said kids out in the great outdoors when the sun decides to poke its face out of its two-week hiding.

Garland Trail, named after Hamlin Garland, one of Wisconsin's greatest and most famous writers,

who also happened to live a portion of his childhood about four blocks away from this small path bridge, is a suburban gem.  Beginning at a convenient parking lot at the tail end of the Clearwater Neighborhood, it climbs up through rustic oaks, a massive birch stand, berry bushes

and out onto one of the few remaining naturally occurring meadows we might find along creases of our bluff lands.  This one also happens to look out over Quarry Lane.  The trail / candy bribery usually burns off

once the hiking moves up hill, but once up there the complaints fade away and the scene rivals any cartoon that we've seen – the trees, losing their leaves, literally paint the landscape, the maples and oaks flare and trunks of birch look something like light tubes in the background brightening the forest.  

The backside trail cools once off the open meadow, so it's time to zig zag down the rocky trail but by then it's mostly smiles, 

the Tootsie Pop is gone, and it's time to bring to life the tastes of the season (porcini and cremini mushroom) in a soup back home…