1. First thing yesterday morning my mom and I were walking when Denali scared a cow moose out of the pond and up a hill. Prancing behind that cow was a bull with a monster rack. It was sort of comical that a guy that huge could move that sprightly. It had to be awfully hard on his neck. She grazed and wandered aloof. He strutted around ridiculously attentive. As he should be.

2. Andy, Denali, and I took the afternoon off . We paddled into a couple of lakes I hadn’t seen before. Bonus. I was so happy to be me yesterday. Photos don’t begin to capture the energy we pulled from the sun, the colors, the smells of fall.

We did have a little time to poke around and find artifacts from the former cabins-once on the beach of Tuscarora Lake—part of the resort before the Wilderness Act made them illegal.

Before we started asking people “Do you have any cans or glass bottles with you?” Andy loves that historical treasure hunting.

I was portaging the canoe when I heard Denali go ballistic and Andy started hollering at her, and telling me to get off the trail “Bull Moose!!” I didn’t see him charge Denali, but I did see the evidence of a stressed out stomping moose emptying a very large bladder, before he turned around and trotted away. We did proceed with caution, he was massive and unpredictable.

3. This morning, while chasing down the bus (our first chance to miss it this year….) up popped a big old bull–over the road, and down in the ditch again. Shelby squealed, but really, we weren’t even that close to clipping it. I could feel it, the truck had plenty of time to stop, he wasn’t going to charge us.

They’re big. They’re on the move, that’s for sure. And so go the seasons. And so goes the rut.