Hawkshadow

I went to the Crum this afternoon to soak up the low-60s sunshine and see how much blooming had occurred there in the past week. Most of the trees are still bare, with only a tiny powdering of buds to indicate that they're waking up. I read some more of Iain Banks' Inversions while on Alligator Rock high above the Creek (is that nickname still used? I mean the outcropping just north of the Science Center, with the wooden steps leading to it).

After half an hour I wandered back along the trail, and stopped to read some more atop a fallen tree. While I was there a shadow swept by, like when a plane passes in front of the Sun. I looked up and there were two... then three, then *five* raptors gliding over the valley. I think they were hawks, though I only saw them as silhouettes. They soared around for five minutes, spending most of their time circling above the rock I had just left---darn---before heading further upcreek.