It's a beautiful time to be out on the Saco Heath
The run of sunny weather has finally dried most of the mucky bits and calmed the mosquitoes, so the trail was overall quite pleasant to walk. The early leaves are changing in the woodland (especially along its fringe), and the blueberry bushes on the heath are reddening up. Red squirrels and/or chipmunks were all roaming about, and some of the first acorns are hitting the ground. Better, the cottongrass on the heath-proper is in bloom, and is a virtual sea of white puffballs. Beautiful, especially backlit by late summer sun.
 
The trail boardwalk itself is in its expected state of decay. A few dozen boards throughout are broken or nearly so. The worst patch is a 4 to 5-foot section near the far end in which the side trusses have collapsed. Only the central span is still holding the planks, which have broken, shifted, and splintered about.
Extreme care should be used for that little jaunt. Elsewhere, two trees are down. The first is lying safely completely across the trail, about 100 yards in from the parking lot. Folks with long legs can just walk over it; others will have to shimmy over. The second tree, a pitch pine out on the heath, is wedged against a few other pitch pines near the benches and seems secure. It's not really blocking the trail -- just requires a little ducking to get out of the way of its upper branches.
 
Overall, this is a really gorgeous time to enjoy the trail, especially while the drier weather holds!
 
The next Nature Conservancy cleanup of the Heath will be on Saturday, Sept. 26, starting at 10AM. More info can be received via volunteersmaine@tnc.org.