Peek-a-boo

Curious_elk.jpg, originally uploaded by craptastica.

Weekends are for walking in the woods. Last week I took a hike in the mountains above the Penas Negras river near Cuba. There's really nothing at all unique or showy about the place, except that I hadn't really seen that area before.

The Penas Negras, near its junction with the Rio de las Vacas, has been primarily used for timber, grazing, and hunting for centuries. Old logging roads, cattle troughs, tree stumps, and pasture fencing shape the landscape like the irreversable affects of time on ones face. Yet it provides for a concentration of wildlife since people don't visit much anymore.

As I hiked throughout the afternoon I kept running into this yearling elk. The first time I saw it I was sucking air after climbing up an old logging road with a lung busting slope, and I kept hearing this weird mewing sound. So I turned around and this elk was walking right toward me. It startled me, which in turn startled the elk, and we went separate ways.

Then I climbed another hill to the east and there it was again, standing watchfully in the dappled shade of pine near the edge of a small clearing. It walked behind a large ponderosa pine and then proceeded to unabashedly stare at me. In the spirit of reciprocation, I took a photo. Then we both went our way again.

So as I said before, weekends are for walking in the woods.