9-22-12

5:40pm

Around 11:00am we went to Hoover

to take some nature hikes and treasure hunting

as I like to call it.

It was pretty windy out there.

They said we could have wind gusts up to 45 mph today.

The first place we stopped was about midway down the reservoir 

where there's an abandoned road.

From there we went to Galena to

another abandoned road with a bridge.

This isn't a place with nice paved

bike and walk paths.  You rough it climbing

over trees, rocks, through the mud, water and weeds.

This is the kind of nature walks I like,

off the beaten path.

Next we walked to the farthest point

in the photo above.

Would have like to of made it over

to the boardwalk but another flowing

waterway prevented us from doing so. 

Normally in the Spring through mid Summer

this is all under water.  You wouldn't even be able

to get to the bridge on foot.

 Check out this gem Christopher found,

an 11 point buck!

Probably would never find another one of these

again on our nature hikes.

Jonathan found a fishing pole with reel.

More than likely is was an unattended pole

that got pulled into the water by a fish.

We did find a bunch of bobbers, sinkers

and lures today as well.

 On our return trip back to the truck getting

ready to go to the boardwalk guess what we found?

A woolly worm!

And guess what?  He was ALL BLACK!!!

Not good!  It means a bad Winter.

Heading back to the truck.

Under the boardwalk.  People usually fish off

the boardwalk when the water is up.

This is usually all full of water up underneath

the boardwalk!

The ground was a little dry from the drought.

But, we did get a few raindrops while here

at the boardwalk.  The clouds started looking a little dark.

Jonathan found an Android 4 cell phone

someone must of lost over the boardwalk

when there was water below.

Stopped by Red Bank before returning home.

Rain clouds moving in.

Sunbury and Smothers Rds.

These are the bottles we found today.

The two brown bottles are root beer and Faygo bottles.

I don't think the brown root beer bottle second

to the left is a newer bottle so may toss it.

The greenish bottle without a lid I think

is a Coke bottle.

The other clear glass bottle with lid

I found out is made by a company called

Hazel Atlas and that's about as far as I've gotten with it. 

And of course the small jar is a Heinz baby food jar.

8:30-9:00pm


Got a hankering for something sweet
so made up something that was quick, easy
and with was ingredients I had on hand.

Soda Cracker Toffee Cookies

Cover a cookie sheet with aluminum foil.
Line a single layer of saltine crackers over pan.
I used about 1 1/4 sleeves of crackers. 

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

1 cup butter
1 cup dark or light brown sugar

Bring to boil in pan and boil for 4-5 minutes.

Pour over top of crackers.
Place cookie sheet in oven
and bake 4-5 minutes.
Remove from and turn off oven.

In a bowl mix together
1 small package of fudge pudding mix,
2 tablespoons melted butter,
1/4 cup milk,
1 1/2 cups powdered sugar

Put dollops of this pudding fudge on
top of crackers.  Return to oven.
The oven will still be warm.
After a couple minutes of being in the oven
the pudding will soften.
Remove and spread pudding fudge with a spoon or knife
evenly over crackers.

Allow to cool completely then place in fridge
for the fudge topping and toffee to harden.

Break crackers apart and enjoy!

Usually this recipe calls for putting
chocolate chips on top the baked toffee crackers
and spread around.  I didn't have any chips
of any kind so that is why I am trying
the pudding fudge instead.
And of course the pudding fudge calls
for a cooked pudding and I only had the instant
kind.  So let's hope it works.

Sometimes you may have all the ingredients
on hand while other times you will have
to try and makes substitutions with
what you do have.