I was out on my bike when it hit town. A huge cold front rolled over the hills bringing wind, rain, and most importantly, cooler, less humid weather.

There's one spot down in a narrow valley where the chesnut trees are already losing their leaves. As I rode through there today, the leaves were falling like rain in the swirling winds of the cold front. All around me chestnuts were plummeting towards the ground, bouncing inches from my tires on the pavement.

As I climbed slowly away from the creek at the bottom of the valley, the leaves picked up arround me and spun in high circles over the roadway. The shoulder of the road was already choked with wet fallen leaves that sung quiet squishy notes beneath the narrow tires of my bike.

With the temperature dropping and rain falling intermittently among the swirling leaves, all I could think of was fall. It's stopping by this week to get a feel for the place. But it's not yet quite here to stay.

We took the dogs out to a local park for a swim and a walk earlier in the day. The woods are still lush and green, celebrating all of summer's wonderous glory. The sunlight filtered through the canopy and danced on the underbrush.

In all, today was the perfect ceremonial end for summer. It began hot and humid with a walk through the green woods and ended cool and comfortable with a bike ride through a wonderland of falling leaves.