A Walk in the Park

The population of the town we now live in is 134,000. That is six times larger than the last town we lived in. We are five minutes away from Chicago's largest shopping center - Woodfield Mall, which supposedly is the  #1 tourist attraction in Illinois. There are tons of restaurants around here, and best of all, our library is the second largest public library in the state. Yet we have a small town feel. We are just a few blocks from the town square. We are close enough to the hub-bub of the shopping center and other shops on the busy strip, yet far enough away not to have to drive on that road if it isn't necessary. (Especially during the Christmas season. Yikes!)

One thing this town has is plenty of parks. It is my goal to visit as many of them as possible. So far we've been to four. This park is located very near our home.

This is the walkway in front of our place that leads to the park and beyond to the library an the town square.

We entered the park and came upon this wooden bridge.

The bridge crosses over a little canal

that leads from the large pond. Here is a view of the pond.

(These photos were taken a month ago, when the trees were all still green!)

Those are swans paddling around in the water. We got a closer look a little later.

There are several trees that have fallen over, whether it is due to a bad storm, I'm not sure. But the trees continue to grow. Here is an example.

Imagine my surprise after taking the pictures of the swans and this tree, then turned around and saw this!

What the???

And no, it's not "Bigfoot"!

I walked around it and saw this.

I didn't see the name of the sculpture or the size. "XXL" I'd say!

Here is a view of the sculpture from across the pond.

We turned around and headed out of the park. This swan was just about under the bridge when we started across it, and he changed his mind and high-tailed it out of there!

We noticed this sculpture right outside of the park and walked over to get a closer look. At first we thought it was a sundial, but then, upon inspection,decided it was just a piece of art.

I hope to bring you more pictures as we visit the different parks. Stay tuned.