Golden Gate Park (10/07/2021)

today i had no agenda at all. i wandered through the ballfield and ended up walking through the west end of the CAS Botanical Garden, where i saw Common Sunflowers blooming. don’t remember them there before! also, a couple Fava Bean were out! don’t remember seeing them last year either. i was tempted to take one, i must admit. watched an Anna’s Hummingbird feeding on Mexican Bush Sage on MLK. saw a ginormous puffball or bracket mushroom near the Fairy Door. and, i strolled onto the Pioneer Trail from that end, which i rarely do for some reason. i was instantly greeted by a Townsend’s Warbler in a tree above me. i love that i see them on almost every outing these days. i happened upon the pine tree on the trail that i used to often see the Great Horned Owls of Stow Lake in. i thought, “When will they be back?” took a chance and looked up with my binocs. and, ONE WAS THERE!! my gawd, it’s been a while! it was sleeping, of course. i continued on, so dang happy. and, i noticed so many blooming flowers along the way – Mexican Sunflowers and Roseleaf Sage and Fuchsia paniculata. and a tree stump with what looked like a mouse door at the base of it. and a cracked open Jimsonweed seed that scared the crap out of me. and all the flowers around the Log Cabin. i looked at the cabin for a while, and i thought how nice it’d be to live in it. i followed where my feet took me, and i ended up on super off path trails that led me to the Stow Lake Picnic Area. hadn’t been back there in ages. and, the picnic area had a bunch of blooming flowers, too! Dally Pine and Indian Shot and Angel’s Trumpets. i’m just amazed at how much is flowering right now. are they late bloomers from summer? early bloomers from fall/winter?? whatever the reason(s), it was a flower-filled day, despite the pics i chose to share of it! i looped back and walked alongside the Pioneer Trail to head home. stopped one more time at the pine tree, and the GHO was very awake and darting its head at every sound from the stupid fleet week flybys that had started up again. i even watched it turn its head 180 degrees to watch one of the jets fly past. couldn’t help but wonder what it was thinking right then.