A friend and I regularly meet to chat over coffee and then usually finish up by walking the maintained trail in the Halifax Mainland Common Park, but today we decided to take a brief excursion onto the unmaintained trails criss-crossing the park. The last gasp of a faint summer and early signs of fall are evident everywhere.

Some mushrooms are dried and cracked in a mosaic pattern:

Ferns and other brush are browning amongst the various greens of late summer:

A few late blueberries still cling to isolated bushes here and there:

The riot of fall colours in this small clearing, dotted with cotton-grass, burst into view as we round a corner, set behind by a backdrop of nearby buildings:

The ferns here are vivid, like a slow burning fire that will take the rest of fall to burn out:

We appreciate one last splash of colour before we head back under the cover of woods to rejoin the maintained trail:

So many times we’ve travelled our usual route “on automatic”. I’m happy today we left the more travelled trail to share in these glimpses of the changing of seasons in a wilderness preserved for our enjoyment immediately at hand to a densely populated part of the city.