Reflections On A Summer Afternoon ...

“Summer afternoon, summer afternoon; to me those have always been the two most beautiful words in the English language.”

    ~ Henry James

      ~ 1843-1916

The poetic beauty of an afternoon in summer, my most favorite of seasons, reflects on an August day at Leaser Lake, in the shadow of the northern Blue Mountain Ridge, New Tripoli, Pennsylvania.

Leaser Lake’s namesake is Frederick Leaser, an American patriot who in September 1777 with his farm team hauled The Liberty Bell from Philadelphia to Allentown where it was concealed in Zion Reformed Church for protection during the Revolutionary War. His homestead is located one mile north of the lake.

Leaser Lake was built by the Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission for water-oriented recreation and opened for public use in 1971. Lehigh County leases this area from the state and operates and maintains the park. The land north of the lake was purchased by the county in the early 1970s. It is entirely wooded and is used for nature study and as an addition to the State Game Lands No. 217.

I Remember Mama ...

“There is only one happiness in life, to love and be loved.”

              ~ George Sand

        ~ pseudonym of Amantine Lucile Aurore Dupin, French novelist & memoirist

               ~ 1804-1876

It doesn’t get sweeter than this, seeing a beautiful white-tailed deer fawn and its mama doe in a tender moment a gorgeous early August evening in the park – a honey of a summer sight!      

Only The Summer Knows ...

“The summer smiles, the summer knows

And unashamed, she sheds her clothes

The summer smooths the restless sky

And lovingly she warms the sand on which you lie

The summer knows, the summer’s wise

She sees the doubts within your eyes

And so she takes her summer time

Tells the moon to wait and the sun to linger

Twists the world ‘round her summer finger

Lets you see the wonder of her arm?

And if you’ve learned your lesson well

There’s little more for her to tell

One last caress, it’s time to dress for fall …”

              ~ “The Summer Knows”

               ~ Michel Legrand

                     ~ 1932-2019

     ~ theme from the 1971 film “Summer of '42”

            

Only the summer knows what the hot and humid breeze is whispering through the trees and summer grasses in this sepia capture of the Bobolink Trail, just off the Delaware and Lehigh National Heritage Corridor (D&L Trail), I shot in the early evening in late July at Lehigh Gap.

In the shadow of the Kittatinny Ridge, also called Blue Mountain, the Lehigh Gap in Slatington, Pennsylvania, is a crossroads where the Lehigh Gap Nature Center’s trails connect two historic trails – the Appalachian Trail and D&L Trail.

The Bobolink Trail connects the D&L Trail with the Lehigh and New England (LNE) Trail about 1.2 miles north and west of the Osprey House at Lehigh Gap Nature Center. It is named for the Bobolink, a representative of the migrant grassland bird species that Lehigh Gap Nature Center hopes to attract to the refuge’s re-vegetated prairie grasslands. 

The Appalachian Trail, a foot path, follows the ridge on both sides of the Lehigh Gap, running 1,245 miles south to Georgia and 930 miles north to Maine. Running from Wilkes-Barre to Bristol, the D&L Trail passes through the Lehigh and Delaware rivers and their canals in Pennsylvania.