Each September members of the Springfield Naturalists’ Club have a weekend nature retreat at the Stump Sprouts Lodge in Hawley, Mass. It is a thriving cross-country ski area in the winter and offers beautiful scenery and rustic accommodations in the other seasons.
The grounds and trails offer many nature photo opportunities and we also use the lodge as a base to visit nearby state forests and other areas. The lodge faces east and the mornings offers superb views of the sunrise sky. At some point I will need to do a gallery of all of the mornings I have experienced there, but for now enjoy this small selection of experiences from this fantastic place.
Click on a picture to begin an interactive gallery show. Use the arrows on the screen or on your keyboard to change pictures. Click outside of a picture to exit the show.
-
- The gardens at Stump Sprouts are full of beautiful flowers as well as food for the excellent meals.
-
- The gardens face east and catch the beautiful early morning light
-
- This hummingbird stopped to check me out as I photographed in the gardens
-
- Mixed-color leaves offer great opportunities for detail shots.
-
- I found this on an outing to an old cemetery in a nearby state forest
-
- This junco found the stones to be good perches as it chased down flying insects.
-
- I was able to get some shots of this Cedar Waxwing on the trip to the state forest
-
- Here is an example of the many fall ferns to be found in the fields around the lodge.
-
- This field has a view to the south
-
- This is a view to the south on a Friday evening
-
- There are a few old pieces of machinery scattered in the old field
-
- A view from the field looking to the north east
-
- Here is an example of the view that rewards early risers.
-
- A view from a different morning
-
- The variety of scenes from this view seems never-ending.
