I started my walk at around 1PM on Saturday afternoon after finishing a work shift in the Weitz Center for Creativity. It was extremely nice out, and as I walked south on Union Street I saw several people out enjoying the weather (and one very cute dog) and heard plenty of birdsong.

Once I reached the intersection of 5th Street and Union Street where my area begins, I took a moment to start to focus on my surroundings. I haven’t had much reason to go into the neighborhoods past the Weitz, so this was a place that I was seeing for the first time. This time of year isn’t the most flattering for Northfield, with lots of dirty melting piles of snow and not-yet-green grass, but the nice weather more than makes up for it, and since I had made it further into the neighborhood I could hear children playing outside enjoying the weather as well.

I continued south on Union Street, before breaking off for my first “spur” down 6th Street. This is when I first noticed a peculiarity about the area I was walking in: while the Union Street side is firmly in the residential area of Northfield with tree-lined streets, Washington Street is a much larger road with Family Fare and other businesses on the other side. This meant that as I walked my spurs toward Washington Street, there would be less tree cover and more open areas, resulting in a very different feel between the homes located on Union Street and those on Washington Street.

Many of the trees contributing to the tree-cover on the east side of the area were these very beautiful trees (pictured to the right) that I believe are maples of some kind. I passed several where various different kinds of swings had been set up for kids to play on. While the first sets of branches of most of these trees were pretty high off the ground, I imagine that they would be a fun place for neighborhood kids to climb.

As I walked back along 6th Street toward Union Street again, I noticed another tree-related thing of interest, a large pine tree in a front yard with many broken and fallen branches.

I saw several other pine trees later in the walk with similar damage, and since the needles on the fallen branches still look so fresh, my suspicion is that the damage came from some of the stormy weather we had last week. My other guess would be that these branches broke under the weight of the snow during the winter, since I did not see any broken branches on any deciduous trees in the area.

Past the broken tree I returned to Union Street once more and continued south, passing a group of about five children that were playing in the yard of one of the houses. They had drawn some chalk art on the sidewalk wishing passers-by a Happy Easter, and I tried my best not to step on it. These kids also had one of the most interesting toys (?) I have ever seen, which was a miniature toilet. The sight of this tiny toilet sitting out in the middle of the sidewalk was pretty funny, but I did not take any pictures to respect the kids’ privacy.

The next east-west spur wasn’t as interesting as the last, but I again observed how much more open things were closer to Washington Street. The image on the left was taken while I was still on Union Street, and something about the cleanness of the colors makes this house look almost toy-like to me. The image on the right was one of the most interesting architectural choices I saw in this area, especially because there were other overhangs that were not nearly as decorated as this one on the same house. These two houses also illustrate the wide variety of architecture in the area, as the first is very modern in appearance while the second is older looking and a bit worn down. I returned to Union Street once more and began walking around the last residential block on my southward walk.

Finishing up the last east-west spur, I saw some of my favorite decorations in this area. The first was the red house which had a truly impressive amount of fake greenery. It looked a little awkward with spring around the corner, but I suspect would look better with snow on the ground. The same house had the fun little lamps pictured in the middle around the side. The final house of interest has my favorite porch of any in this walk, just because of how many different holidays and seasons it represents. It is somewhat hard to see on the image, but it has a wind chime tangled in Christmas lights and the door has Halloween-themed stickers. I hope someone sets the wind chime free from its Christmassy prison.

The southmost block of my area consists of Washington Park and the Northfield City Hall. I did not take any pictures of the park, since there were several people out enjoying it on the playground, at the picnic tables, and on the basketball court.

I did not actually know this is where the Northfield City Hall is located (as it is just labeled “Northfield Motor Vehicle” on Google Maps, probably because it contains the Northfield DMV), so I was somewhat surprised to see the sign out front. I find it interesting that Google Maps has the City Hall labeled just as the DMV, and if you zoom in close enough also “Northfield Finance”, but that’s it. I looked at my hometown on Google Maps, and it has the City Hall labelled as well as parking for it.

At this point, all I had left was to head north along Washington Street and then back along 5th Street to my starting point to complete the full circuit of the area. While the Washington Street side has a very different atmosphere due to the lack of tree cover and bigger road, it still was very much part of the same neighborhood. Maybe because I was walking on the weekend, but there wasn’t too much extra noise from the larger road being right there, though I did see more cars than on the Union Street side.

Pictured to the left is my favorite front yard that I saw on this walk. It has some cool levels and is visually interesting even without any plant growth, so I would love to see what it looks like when things start growing.

Also along this street I passed another kid playing in their yard, along with a cat, which I stopped briefly to pet. At this point I reached the corner of Washington Street and 5th Street and began the final stretch of my walk. I wasn’t expecting to see anything else interesting, but the last two houses had some of the coolest brickwork:

The house on the right is also notable because it is the first house that I looked at when beginning my walk, but the fence that you can see in the left of the image totally obscures it from the Union Street side, so I was only able to see this brickwork when coming from another direction. I think if I was not on a busy college student’s schedule, I would try and walk the whole path I took in reverse, to see what else I might not have noticed because I only looked at it from one direction.

My final observation was that as I walked back onto campus and familiar places, I noticed how much more I was looking up and taking in my surroundings. Usually I just look down as I walk, but on my way back I was looking up and around even as I walked through familiar places. For that reason, I am glad that I walked through this unfamiliar place, as it was easier to train myself to be alert and observant when taking in a new place and looking for its unique landmarks.