Beyond the Big Stone; Leap Year Day Rock Piles

I always said I’d go back to this site, a big stone on a jumble of stone rows, - which time has been unkind to, it turns out:

Looking East

It’s on the far side (of the road that runs along) the next floodplain to the south of where I live, on a west facing terrace above the river and floodplain. I couldn’t cross the river so instead I went back to the same place I’d been the day before, opposite bank from the Old Mill. I’ve seen the old zigzag stone rows that touched the river disappear over the last three or four decades I’ve been wandering around the River and its uplands, never photographing them because I just didn’t know what I think I know now. I believed in the old Colonial Myth and film was expensive, as was developing. A big 100 year flood wiped out a tremendous amount of them – just before I’d visited this big stone for the first time.

There still remain these linear sorts of rows on both sides of the river below the Old Mill. Are they Indian or Colonial? I don’t know…

I walked maybe a quarter mile downstream, cut east a little and finally got to this stone row (after crossing a couple of other East/West linear Rows).

I scrambled thru some nasty brush of the invasive kind, taking some souvenir thorns with me and finally made it to the Big Stone. Face-like from the distance, it wasn't so much when I got right up to it.

Some animal forms perhaps? More than one?

Left facing Bear? Right facing Turtle ?

(Above: South facing Turtle close up; Below: Looking West)

What I remembered as a triple row of stones just didn't seem to be more than impression, but looking south:

(Above: East west row in background, foreground is a zigzag row, perched boulder at junction)

Single Stone turtle again

Looking uphill, I spot some mounds:

Mound and circular ring

Short row that leads to long linear N/S row:

Another larger mound with a tree sprouting out of it (above)

Back to the East/west row (below)

6th Mound:

7th:

8th in distance as snow begins to fall:

I got more scratches getting in here: