The days of autumnal visual splendour are now swiftly coming to an end. Each day we venture into the ravine there is a steadily decreasing landscape of bright foliage. Wind and rain has served to separate foliage from tree branches and most of the deciduous trees in the forest are now bare, or close to it. And with each day that passes, the new-fallen leaves which colour the forest floor are beginning to fade from bright yellow, orange and red to a variety of shades of brown.

It's still beautiful to see the depth of the fallen leaves covering the ground. The browns make for a subdued blanket on the forest floor and the trails leading through the forest interior, but the overall prospect is also warm in appearance with its own special kind of visual attraction. There's one area where oaks predominate and under the steadily denuding trees the acrid fragrance of tannin is even more pronounced than it is elsewhere.

Unsurprisingly we've had a lot of rain and wind to go with the creep into late fall for it is fall, after all, and that's to be expected. But yesterday despite the wind and the humid atmosphere at 10C, it seemed mild, and since the sun kept evincing itself through the light cloud cover the landscape was also considerably brightened.

Jackie and Jillie enjoyed a few diversions, meeting up with other dogs as anxious as they are to be out and about on the trails. Timbit was there, hauling the rope that his humans have accustomed him to wear around his neck. He looked pretty spiffy, after an appointment at the groomer's. His predecessor Kira, was also a very small schnauzer just like him, but she had a spontaneously warm and friendly personality whereas Timbit tends to be standoffish.

He's getting older though, about the same age as Jackie and Jillie, and now likes to acknowledge them and snuffle about alongside them companionably. He wasn't the only familiar dog to express quiet satisfaction in the cooling atmosphere and changed landscape that Jackie and Jillie had some interplay with on their afternoon walk. Everyone we come across and speak with as we pass one another on the trails expresses gratitude that the weather has been so relatively moderate, and that we've been able to enjoy our daily perambulations.

The very fact that it is so easy for us and for others to access this forest to add quality to our daily lives as we poke about in it and stride along, crushing the underfoot foliage and listening to the shushshushshush of our boots, feeling the sun sneaking its light-and-warmth rays through a far more open forest canopy to bliss our backs and the top of our heads with warmth reminds us of just how very fortunate we are.

Back at home again, the ritual of looking through the garden beds to assemble an inventory of tasks needing to be done preparing the garden for winter, inspires a reluctance in us to actually get serious and down to work. Bit by bit. But that so much vegetation is yet green, and so many of the flowering plants continue to sustain themselves, helped no doubt by copious rain events protecting them against night-time nips of frost, convinces us there's no hurry. Yet.

And while we were at it, the loopy hopping about of a cricket took my eye. I thought how neat it would be to get a photograph. I've tried before, and never succeeded. Just too slow at the task, and the cricket always manages to assemble itself for another giant leap, and I've lost the opportunity. Not this time. I managed the snap, and then suddenly, it was gone....