Fall Foliage Fun

Today was a sunny, crisp, breezy fall day perfect for outdoor time. We decided to take a hike along the Potomac from Riverbend Park to Great Falls Park and back.

Before we show some of the scenery, Geek Girl the Tour Guide would like to say a few words:

Now for some of the scenery. We saw lots of lovely fall color:

We also saw a cute fuzzy Wooly Bear Caterpillar:

Geek Girl was thrilled when we discovered later that the Wooly Bear Caterpillar becomes the Isabella Tiger Moth (thank you, Wikipedia): "Wow! It starts off as a bear and becomes a tiger! That's so cool!"

Once we arrived at Great Falls, we had lunch and then headed off for Geek Girl to record her promotional video and to show Mama Geek the flood pole. Next, Geek Girl decided she wanted to go down to the river. This involves a pretty steep climb down a rocky chute, but she was definitely a Super Tiger Tigress and scrambled down to the bottom with me. There, she snapped this picture of me

and some friendly folks took this picture of the two of us right at the river

We also had a front-row seat to watch the kayakers at play:

After a little while, it was time to climb back up - Geek Girl did a great job again, except this time she slipped and landed bottom-first in the little stream going down the gully. Despite this little setback, she hiked back all the way to Riverbend Park and got an unexpected treat: some riders were there on horseback and let her pet and feed a carrot to one of their horses. "It was fun, but it was kind of gross when the horse slobbered all over my hand!" is Geek Girl's review.

This was an easy and fun trail for a sunny fall family walk, and is definitely Geek-recommended. It's even suitable for visitors (grandparents, perhaps?) who might want to see some fall color next October.