It is nice to hear from my old friendsOne of the best things about me blabbing on and on .. here on this blog is that people actually come to see if I am here... Love and Hugs to ALL who have come by to say hello while I have been away settling into my latest journey. One thing I can say, since about 1995 or so my life has never been dull ! One of my favorite things to blog about is where I live and things I have learned about and places I have seen and taken pictures of. There are places on Long Island that people do not even know about. It is my duty to set out and find those places and take pictures . I love Long Island, but there is so little of it left to nature these days. Even with this awful economy and foreclosures all around us here, new developments keep springing up all over the place. It is money madness and with gas prices the way they are headed, I do not see people any longer willing to commute as far as they have been. Still Long Island as expensive as it is .. is a sort of paradise. I love living here, there are a few other places I might live, one being the Jersey Shore, and the Delaware Water Gap area of PA. I detest Florida, as beautiful as it is - it is so hot ! SO anyhow back to the beauty. Since moving where I have moved, when I have time I explore the back roads. During one of my exploration sessions I came upon a nature preserve I never knew existed. 350 acres of absolutely untouched wilderness 5 minutes away from my house. I drove by many times and two weeks ago was doing the same and decided .. today is the day. I went in and it was so beautiful I spent 2 hours walking the paths. I was very careful but found ticks on me anyhow when I got out which was very dismaying because I would spend every Sunday morning there if I had the time. It took me back to my dad telling me that his father used to go fishing at lakes in the area and I felt positive he had been there 100 years before me. I felt close to him - close to nature and just felt so peaceful in general and in total awe of how beautiful it all is. The sad thing is that less than a mile away the town of Riverhead has approved the building of an indoor ski mountain vacation park with an indoor water park also. We have a water park and we are about 2 hours from decent skiing and 4 from good skiing. Who needs this mountain ? No one I have talked to wants the darn thing. Building this resort so close to the Preserve will affect its well being. It saddens me because aside from the ticks... it is a wonderful place to walk and bring children so they can see what the island used to be like. I pray that the park is never built. I pray that someone helps to just buy the land they want to put the park on and save it. The area is a major aquifer and is part of the pine barrens which are supposed to be kept untouched. What the hell is the use of designating acerage as pine barrens if you build a monster park that is going to affect it in a very negative way. Makes NO sense .. but then these things never do... Here are some glimpses of my paradise, click on the link .. this video was created by a local man who is fighting to save the area and the lands which are so beautiful... http://youtube.com/watch?v=wJJAkOB7Ln8 Happy Sunday .. xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxxoo | 
