I visited Bull Creek District Park on February 14, 2015 at 1 pm and it was 75 degrees outside.
This day was filled with many people, mostly couples because of the particular day, but still there were many families and it brought me back to the times when I used come with my family and it made me really nostalgic for a simpler time.
This visit, in contrast to last month’s, I decided to venture deeper into the creek. I went through the water and past the area where people mainly stay and found a beautiful alcove of sorts. It was so beautiful that I couldn’t help but stop and take pictures of it. (The pictures are sideways but if you click on them you can see them the correct way)
In these first two pictures you can see the whole alcove itself. One picture is the view from the entrance and the other is from once you walk into it. You can see how the bottom is concave and it is so fascinating to me how things like this form completely from environmental causes. Crazy how beautiful things can become when humans stop touching things..
These next two pictures are an up close picture of the rock formations with this green type of fungus growing on it. As you walk under these rocks there is no chance of you staying dry. There is a constant water drip coming out of the green fungus even though it was sunny and warm outside. That is fascinating! I don’t know the exact reason for the constant drip, but it was beautiful and I would love to learn more about it.
As you walk out of the alcove and look at the ground you can see perfect rows of rock to walk along. Things such as this are so interesting to me because how can the environment shape these rocks into perfectly straight rows without human contact?
As I am writing this I am still just so fascinated about what the earth can become when people stop destroying it and turning everything into something it wasn’t created to be. It makes me wonder what things would turn into if people stopped touching bull creek completely what it would turn into; and currently bull creek is taking initiatives to move in that direction. Not completely shutting people off of course, but it is currently a “growing zone” the city is not allowed to come in and cut any of the brush or anything in attempts to help the environment and the ecosystem of the various species in the area to allow them to continue to grow. I think that is amazing because Bull Creek holds such a dear place in my heart and to see Austin taking steps in the direction to preserve it makes me very happy and reminds me of a quote from The Sand County Almanac. “A thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise.”
The main thing I learned from this trip is that when we take actions to preserve our ecosystems we can see the real beauty of what it can become.