Down the rabbit hole

There is a gravel road, across the busy street from here, that only runs about 3 houses deep, and ends with a "Dead End" sign.  If you're in a car, the sign is for you.  If you're walking, or on a bike, not so much.

This path takes you thru to another world, it seems.  The houses are nice, maybe on bigger lots than on this side (except for the ones on the gravel road, which are HUGE), and because of the way the streets only connect to busy streets at a couple of points, there's very little traffic.  And what traffic there is, is usually going much slower than it does out here in the regular world. 

And trees!  Huge, old trees.  Lots of them.

We walk this way most mornings, and often on our last walk of the day, because there are fewer people out, down the rabbit hole, than there are on this side.  It's peaceful, it's mostly quiet, and the people you do encounter are generally rather friendly, as opposed to a lot of the ones on this side. 

And then there are the creatures.  Usually we see some deer, sometimes a whole herd of them.  But the last few days, we've been seeing a fox.  It's reddish, and has a big, bushy tail, but is actually somewhat smaller than Bandit.  I keep telling him we don't really want to meet the fox, up close and personal.  I suspect he'd lose any battle that ensued.

Of course, regardless of what I say, he gets very excited at spotting this creature, and wants to check it out.  So I have to act like Mom the Anchor, and hang on so he doesn't get away to chase the fox.  (This is a pretty good upper body workout, btw.  I highly recommend it.)

Sometimes, the fox comes over to our side of the busy street.  We can hear it, it makes noises almost like a cat but maybe more like a smallish dog.  And Bandit will sense it, at night, outside our fence, he knows there's a creature out there, but I can't see it, and frankly, it kind of scares me a little to know there's something out there, just beyond my fence, that I can't see, but the dog is very interested in handling for me.

This morning we also got a whiff of skunk out there, on the other side.  So far we've not come face to face with one, and I hope our luck holds.  And the other day, there was a racoon sitting on the porch of the house across the street from mine.  This is not a rural area, btw.  And it's always been like this, chock full of creatures.  It's not only since the Corona virus has taken hold.  Tho it is nice to have less traffic, due to the virus, so we can cross over to the other side more quickly, and more safely.