In summer, fields of wildflowers and crystal-clear rivers are almost as intoxicating as the black diamond trails on Aspen Mountain or the hard-earned majesty of the Highland Bowl in winter.

BBC: Living in: Great cities for outdoor adventures

Behind us there was a wall of rough flagstone that smelled of dirt, of fields in summer with the sun beating down after a heavy rain.

NEWYORKER: The Reptile Garden

But this Saturday, we all later agreed, was the first day of summer: the smell of plowed fields and first-cut grass, the river flushed by rains, its banks covered with ferns and May apples and early wild flowers, dame's rocket and white trillium.

NPR: Excerpt: 'Gone Tomorrow'

Yakuts said that somewhere in the south was Dauria, where a broad river watered fields of wheat in the summer sun.

ECONOMIST: The Amur River

The untended fields and the warm and dry summer have combined to provide a splendid breeding-ground for the swarms of locusts.

ECONOMIST: Invasion of the locusts