1207. RI Walks Challenge - C rawley Preserve
Richmond, RI
3/24/22

One of the cutest projects we have seen that started out during the COVID pandemic to get people outdoors a bit more exploring their local woodlands has been the RI Walks Challenge to find a metal carving of a "plant creature" attached to a tree in each of 30 different RI preserves. RIclimber was the one who alerted us to this project in the first place by planting nearby letterboxes in four of the preserves over on his "eastern" side of the state. So, as if just going for walks to see the rest of those "plant creatures" themselves on each of their lovely preserves wasn't enough, naturally we started thinking how cool it would be if all 30 of them could get little rubber stamp carvings of the "plant creatures" to go along with those larger metal ones!

So, we picked the four preserves with "plant creatures" closest to us in our "southwestern corner" of the state, grabbed a carving tool and a few blank "travelin' lights" (small stones with pink carving rubber glued on back that we used to have ready for pre-pandemic trips abroad), hiked the trails to find the "leaf critters" and then "on-the-spot" carved a tiny "replica" to leave nearby! With our carvings, finding the metal tree carvings would be the main focus of any of these short excursions, but we're hoping that the project might catch the fancy of other letterboxers as well, so that eventually all the preserves will be covered with at least one rubber carved "leaf critter", and if some were to get more than one "variation on a theme", that would be pretty cool, too, to get to see people's various "artistic interpretations" of different "plant creatures"!

Anyway, to find this particular "leaf critter", take Old Usquepaugh Road north from route 138 past the grist mill to the marked parking lot up on the left, then follow the yellow trail for hikers only until you see the metal carving. No place for even a "travelin' light" to hide behind this tree , so look behind the next one back to pull out our little "jowly radish" from under its stone covering! Can you guess what it is really meant to be?

And now back to thinking how if everyone who boxes in RI picks a preserve at which to do a quick-carve of a "leaf critter"or two, we could quickly cover this whole RI plant project! Hope that happens!

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