What you see and what your minds eye sees are totally different. In my head it looked more like these two that I played around with in photoshop. And even then, they fall short.
In the world behind my eyes, colors are always much brighter.
I was going to take the shorter cut to get to the crap plant, but changed my mind. Mike (lefthandedboy) took it and beat me to the spot by a few minutes. I had almost turned around when I got to the stretch along the river. There was a set of foot prints in the mud that I pretty much knew were from the evening before. Usually that means the fish won't be biting because they'll all be hook shy. Which is exactly what happened.
Was nice to run into Mike and I showed him how to effectively fish the area. He had minnows and wasn't doing so well either. I guess my foot print theory held up.
The next morning I was out exploring in the down pouring rain. It had rained almost 2 inches over night, so going anywhere in or near flowing water would have been suicidal. Walking around through all the mud was hard enough.
I've always liked looking at before and after pictures.
This is an aerial shot from 2002 of the creek I plan on exploring more this year.
This aerial is from 2006 or 2007, not sure which. You can see how the development was being made. When I got there, some homes were built, half were empty, a few weren't finished and you could tell by the condition of the area that there were no plans to finish anything anytime soon. Build it and they will come only works in movies. At first I got confused on how to get where I wanted to be because of the new roads. I was going off the old aerial. What a wasteland this has turned into.
Further north at the forest preserve they had started the proposed project to improve the site. I joke that they are spending almost $300,000 to put in a road, parking and an outhouse just for me. I'm sure I'll never see anyone else there. Hoover Forest Preserve, just down the road from me, is close to Yorkville and no one is ever there. I can't imagine anyone coming out here. At least getting to the creek will be easier, but I think I still prefer to crap in the woods.
This is how it looked when I was exploring it last year with my daughters. This is the entry with an old building off to the left of the barn.
This is what it looks like now. They are clearing out the under brush to let the new growth come out. I hope they don't take out too many of the blackberries. We picked over a gallon of them here. Maybe with more sun, there will be even more berries. We shall see.
To the right of the barn was an old falling down shed, a newer shed and what I thought was a relatively new area for picnics.
That's all gone now along with all the brush. Last year I had to hack my way through thick brambles to get to the old shed. Now it's all cleared out. I was able to take in pretty much the whole area with one picture.
I've seen enough forest preserve restorations to know that the end result is going to be worth it. If you really want to see a major undertaking of how this works, drive down 31st street west of LaGrange Road. They are doing a major clearing of the under brush for almost a mile. You can see how they are trying to get it to look more like the oak savanna it once was.
I just wonder if there are blackberries growing there too.
What will be next to impossible to fix is tearing out these new abandoned subdivisions that have been built all over this area and letting the land go back to the way it was. My daughter and I explored three more subdivisions between Yorkville and Oswego this past weekend. We were hoping that the retention ponds built along with the homes were stocked with fish before they were abandoned. Nothing but ghost towns and dead looking muddy ponds. A few of the big homes have been sitting out in the middle of fields, empty, for three years now. In the areas where people actually started buying the homes there are a lot of for sale signs and obviously empty homes. Lots of sidewalks to nowhere and the few lucky kids that we saw running around have plenty of wide open acres to eplore. They just have to watch for the hazards of abandoned construction debris, which is everywhere.
It is the epitomy of human arrogance to think these places would succeed. The average person with the average income can not afford the average home. Why did anyone think it was going to get better. I'm working at 30 percent less than what I was making just 8 years ago and I've figured out that if this job goes away, I'll have to take at least another 20 percent cut. Retraining is bullshit. Even now if I were to retrain to do web work, by the time I learned it all most of the work would be going to India or China. It's already happening. So after retraining I would still have to take a 20 percent cut in order to get a different job. At 53 I'm not willing to become a lawyer or doctor. Based on my bills, they are the only ones that have doubled their income in the last 9 years.
It doesn't matter if credit becomes more readily available, real wages are going to continue to plummet. Until the real estate market is allowed to crash to the point where home values are back where they were 20 to 25 years ago, things are not going to get better. Homes are only worth what someone is willing to pay. People my parents age and the beginning of the baby boomers think that the home they bought 25 to 40 years ago have all this equity accumulated. They are all about to find out that unless they are willing to sell their homes for well under $90,000, no one is going to be buying them any time soon.
But then, there's an opportunity. I can start a business going into failed subdivisions and restoring them back to the farms and forests they were just a few years ago. Then as part of the reclemation deal, they have to be turned into conservation easements so they can never be built on again.
Always a silver lining.