Steve Fagin

Ospreys circled and a bald eagle sprang from the branch of an oak, as our kayak group paddled into Lyme's Hamburg Cove last week. New foliage glowed in late afternoon sunlight; the rustle of leaves mingled with splashing paddles.

Last week, I joined a volunteer crew that finished building a sturdy wooden span across Cowslip Brook at The Merritt Family Forest, a 75-acre nature preserve owned and maintained by the Groton Open Space Association (GOSA) near the top of Fort Hill.

Friends and I were delighted, but not exactly amazed, to see and hear a wide array of birds the other morning, while we hiked at the Maxwell Mays Wildlife Refuge in Coventry, R.I.: mallard duck, tufted titmouse, Baltimore oriole, ovenbird, scarlet tanager, veery, red-eyed vireo, black-capped chickadee, prairie warbler, pine warbler, great crested flycatcher, eastern towhee, chipping sparrow ...

If you live in a tiny, 20-by-8 house — about half the size of a school bus — chances are you venture out frequently to stretch your legs.

While strolling on a grass-lined path along the western tip of Fishers Island the other day, fellow hikers and I savored views of a sparkling Atlantic Ocean, Race Rock Lighthouse, Great Gull and Little Gull islands, and Long Island's Orient Point.

The melodious call of a wood thrush greeted hikers who entered a wooded path in Preston the other morning.

On one of the hottest days and biggest summer holidays of this century last Friday, friends and I bicycled past cars that had backed up bumper-to-bumper through downtown Westerly — all of us heading to the beach.

As friends and I bicycled toward the parking lot at Bluff Point Coastal Reserve in Groton one sunny morning last week, a man who had just stepped out of his car waved to us.