America needs more volunteers; not just our trail systems are at risk. Volunteerism is declining as Americans spend more time at home and less time engaging with their communities. If only they knew: acts of service reduce stress and promote positive, relaxed feelings by releasing glorious waves of dopamine. Less stress = less stroke, heart disease, depression, anxiety and general illness.
Love, Lizard Style
Sonoma Overlook Trail, May 8, 2024
Words of affirmation, acts of service, receiving gifts, quality time, physical touch…the five classic Love Languages.
Lizards have their own seduction style. Redefining the term “love bite,” lizard courtship is known to include the male clenching his desired tightly behind the neck, for hours or even days, until she becomes ready to mate.
Sonoma Overlook Trail lizards are no exception; if you come upon a pair thusly engaged, please leave them undisturbed! The female will emerge from the ritual unharmed.
We Overlook Stewards revere lizards for their own sake as well as for a particular aspect of their role in the eco system that contributes to the protection of humans. Our local breeds of lizards, including the western fence lizard and the northern alligator lizard shown here, eat ticks and also contain a protein that kills the spirochetes in the guts of Lyme infected ticks. So if an infected tick bites one of these lizards, it’s cured of its Lyme Disease. This doesn’t preclude the need to take caution in regards to ticks, but it’s one more reason to appreciate our little friends on the trail.
How to Take Care of Your Feet on a Hike or Ruck
“…if you ever do have to hoof it over a long distance, you’ll quickly come to see how essential it is to know how to keep your feet in tip-top shape; the health of your dogs can mean the difference between an enjoyable outing and a terrible one, and even between life and death.”
The mountains are calling….
Why We Do What We Do
I’ve long intended to bring my recent campaign of tread renewal/trail smoothing from the Overlook Trail to the Montini Preserve, and today I finally did. There had been a short section that I had had my eye on for quite some time, as it checked two big boxes for needing attention: 1) a really rocky and awkward trail, and 2) a section so awkward that hikers and runners had started a mini trail around the awkward part, thus needlessly widening the trail.
Therefore this morning I got our trail wagon out of our toolshed in the Mountain Cemetery, loaded up some buckets with aggregate, threw some tools and all the rest in the back of my SUV and headed up to the trail. Entering from Norrbom Road on Rattlesnake Cutoff, I pulled the wagon into the middle of the Montini Preserve to the section I wanted to fix.
Sonoma Overlook Trail • Montini Open Space Preserve 