74 Acres

        A little over a year ago, my mom inherited, shall we say, a large sum of money when my grandfather passed away. We have always dreamed of having more land than our little postage stamp in the suburbs 5000 square feet - including the house and detached garage - so it seemed like the perfect opportunity. See, here in the SF Bay Area, everything costs more, including the land. Yeah, it stinks. But after looking around for a couple months, we came across a parcel of land MUCH bigger than any we had seen for sale before, and for actually less than the smaller ones. I fell in love with it just from the pictures online, although my family had their doubts. When we all went to go see it, though, they found it to be perfect. Long story short, we got it. After months of dealing with misbehaving banks, the sale closed and we are now the grateful owners of 74 acres of gorgeous land. Yes, it's a bit dry because of the lack of rain, but with some grazing animals and rainfall, it will soon be lush and beautiful. We have a lot of work to do what with fencing and everything to keep predators out, but we're moving right along and hope to get some alpacas shortly. It's nice because we no longer have to go to a range for target practice, and we have a plethora of deer and turkeys to hunt as well. Last time we were out there (it's about 20 minutes from our house), I brought my camera and took a bunch of pictures for y'all. 

        Okay, this is my favorite place. It's a path bordered with trees and carpeted with tiny green sprouts and dried leaves. It's gorgeous. Also, the creek is right off to the side.

         There are a ton of deer around! I'm looking forward to finally having a place to hunt. It's just really a shame when the deer population is so large and they get hit by cars and wasted every day.

        From the very top, you can see both the bay and the nearest mountain. Although I haven't yet seen it myself, our new neighbor says that on a very clear day, you can even see Mount Lassen and the Sierras!!!! For those of you not familiar with California geography, I have a map. Sorry for the bad quality, but I think you get the picture! The circle is about where we are, and then the arrows show where the mountains are.

        I almost can't believe we own this land! It's amazing, and a great responsibility as well. I can't thank God enough for this huge blessing and answer to prayer.

Blessings,

Reyna

Daughter of the Forest

        I know I don't usually post twice in one day, but I wanted to get this out as soon as possible. It was quite an adventure, let me tell you. 

        So, my brother and I started out in the morning to go turkey hunting. The season opened a few days ago, but my brother has been sick so we hadn't gone yet. Today was the day, though. I packed light, and we walked up to that hill, the one we stalked the birds on before. I wrote a post on that here. Anyhooz, we have never been now hunting before, so this was a new experience. I can't say we were very good at it, but I suppose that comes with practice. ;) We were up there for a while; about two hours, stalking the birds and trying to find the big males. (You can't hunt females in the spring, and they're so small, who would want to anyway?). We were walking along one of the drainage ditches, when all of the sudden, my brother goes "Look!" I had walked right past a little faun lying curled up, right out in the open on the hill. At first, I though she was dead - we had actually come across a dead one a bit up the hill that was about the same size. But no, she was alive, although very weak and floppy when I tried picking her up. Sh was ALL legs! She seemed very lethargic, so my brother called my mom and asked her what we should do. 

        Since she seemed so weak, and her sibling had obviously died not too long ago, we thought it best to take her to the wildlife museum about a half hour from our house. We have had experiences with animals dying on the way there, however, so we decided to give her some molasses before we got going. I never have even seen a faun in real life, so to get to hold one on my lap while we drove was amazing! 

        Look at the cute little velvety nose!

        Her fur was SO soft!

        It was so fun to snuggle her, and I hope that she is fine now. At the museum, they said she was really dehydrated, so it was a good thing we brought her. All of our animals, even he ones we have just temporarily, have to have names. She was Tauriel.

        We'll find out what is happening with her - if they're going to try to release he back, in a few days. The whole thing was just so exciting, even if we didn't get a turkey. ;)

Blessings,

Reyna

Stalking Turkeys

        With turkey hunting season fast approaching, my brother and I have been going out every day to scout one of the flocks near our house and figure out its habits and other good information to have. We also explore around a bit; we've found a few places we didn't know about before. I brought my camera a few days ago, and took some pictures as we went. 

        We walk about a half mile from our house and then turn up onto a hill. There are a few little paths, but they are hardly traveled and may as well not be there.

        I spotted the first turkey:

         We climb to the ridge, and then walk along this drainage ditch:

         The creek from up there:

        Then, we cross a street at the top of the hill when we come out of the brush. There is an even bigger hill ahead; that's where we stalk the turkeys. The first of the flock:

        The two Toms:

         We use this landslide control, umm, thing, as a blind to sneak up on them:

        Getting closer:

        Don't they look tasty?

        Once we got halfway up the hill, we were pretty tired from ducking and running up through low brush and grass, so we stopped to rest a minute at this huge oak tree.

        Then we continue on. The day before we had gone kind of around the hill and then taken the road back, but this time we went we continued up the hill. Climbing...

        The top! There was a lovely field of poppies:

        Looking out:

        
        We headed back down through a different neighborhood, and saw a few more interesting things. We ended up tracking through the brush again because we just don't like the city. :)
     
        Snake!

        No, silly, that's an alligator lizard!

         One lone hen:

        We walked back along the trail. That's the farthest we get to wilderness around here. Ugh. At least it's something - I can't wait for turkey season!

Blessings,

Reyna