Yesterday we threw the canoe on top of the Suburban and headed down to Green Turtle Pond before it got too hot. The road, which was never very good, is deteriorating back to dirt. Not much is left of the pavement and what is still there makes for a very slow and bumpy ride. It is pretty though, like a dark green tunnel.

The pond was pretty quiet at that hour of the morning with only a few fisherman bobbing around the edges in their boats.

The canoe is such a thing of beauty, isn’t it?

It was a lovely morning to be paddling around. No breeze had as yet kicked up and the only ripples on the pond surface were from the prow of our canoe breaking the glass-like surface. Our oars dipped in and out of the water with a satisfying rhythm. As we passed the shoreline we heard a big PLOP! and looked in time to see the leftover wake of what was probably a turtle awakened from his on-shore slumber by our passing.

We stopped often to admire the view and the reflections.

We weren’t the only ones enjoying this beautiful morning. We disturbed a heron along the way.

(Sorry for the blur but I didn’t have a chance to change settings. Even though it’s blurry I still wanted to include it here.)

Some areas along the shoreline look like little planted-on-purpose gardens; like these reeds.

And these—all shimmery with sunlight.

I was totally captivated by the damsel flies and dragon flies in the shallow, more boggy parts of the pond. They zoomed and zipped around us at death defying speeds. I tried to capture a few flying by in the sunlight, but this was as close as I got. Can you see them?

Some used us a landing pad, either on my paddle or on the canoe, like these beautiful turquoise damsel flies. I remember my Mom used to call them ‘darning needles.’

We found this smallish bird hopping around in the reeds and spooked him up into the trees. We think it’s an immature double-crested cormorant. We watched him for quite a while.

(Right about now I was truly kicking myself for not bringing along my big zoom lens! Darn!)

They don’t call it Green Turtle pond for nothing! This turtle was sunning on a log until we paddled by.

We saw several other turtles in our trip around the pond; just heads poking up above the surface of the water. Every time I tried to capture them with the camera they ducked back underwater. Sly turtles!

All in all, a lovely paddle trip!