On Saturday I walked a Reston trail, leaving from the park-and-ride lot, traipsing along Lawyers Road for a few hundred feet and then entering the sort of alternative walker’s universe that exists off-road in many places — if we only know where to look for it.

It was muggy and still with sunlight moving across the paved path like swells on the sea. Cardinals and robins darted in and out of the bushes or soared from one tree perch to another while a crow cawed plaintively in the distance.

A well-trod dirt footpath angled off the main trail. It looked so inviting — like the road to an enchanted castle in the forest — that I just had to take it. I strolled alongside yards and houses, past tennis courts and pools. I crossed two streets and interrupted more than one spiderweb before I reversed course and walked back the way I came.

It was just as special going the opposite way, with fetching twists and turns, a tiny bridge over a mossy-rocked brook, and newborn plants in secret gardens. It was proof to me of nature’s variety, and proof too that if we look for a place to walk one we can usually find one.