Hiking

[north woods gal]

Not the greatest snow, over here, either, but at least we do have enough snow to ski. Reports are that the groomed trails are okay, but I don't do groomed trails and my backcountry trails are pretty dangerous, now. Have a couple of inches of snow on top of almost solid ice pack. Makes for way too much glide and almost no kick or control. Pretty spooky for downhill stuff. Forecast is for more icy stuff and then some more weather in the 30s, next week, so not looking good. Not complaining, though. Sounds like I'm lucky to have any snow.

Sooo ... rather than aggravate last week's bike bruising, I went snowshoeing, today, instead, just to play it safe. Did four miles which included some backcountry swamps and bogs that are normally inaccessible other times of year, places that probably never see a human and all within hiking distance of the house. Cool.

Also, this is my first set of woman's specific snowshoes and I love them. They're made by Crescent Moon and they're designed for a woman's narrower and shorter stride, so I can walk normally, not the usual bowlegged style I've had to use with other shoes, all the more so because I am pigeon-toed, too. The beauty of snowshoeing with good shoes is that you can go no matter what kind of snow you have, even pure ice.

[Catrin]

.... The beauty of snowshoeing with good shoes is that you can go no matter what kind of snow you have, even pure ice.

The snowshoes don't go sliding on ice?!?!? COOL! hmmmmmmmmmm

[Crankin]

Nope. That giant crampon in the front is akin to monster ice spikes.

[north woods gal]

Correct. Old traditional wooden snowshoes didn't have crampons, but modern snowshoes usually do and some pretty gnarly ones at that.

[Catrin]

Nice! Perhaps some day I will be brave enough to trust my broken bits to snowshoes. Thanks!

[Catrin]

FINALLY, a very nice 3 mile hike this afternoon on almost perfectly dry mountain bike trails 63 degrees in Indiana on Feb 17 - almost unheard of. It was fun, but my feet are telling me they noticed that we've not been hiking regularly.

They say it will get even warmer - even into the 70's which will potentially break the all time record high since 1930 - and other records are open for breaking for each of the next 7 days. If we do manage to hit the 60's or higher for the streak they are forecasting, that in itself will be an all-time record since they started keeping records. I do have hikes of shorter or longer duration planned for the next two days. Rain isn't in the forecast before Tuesday...

[Pax]

Congrats on the hike! Sounds great.

Yeah, this weather has been bizarre, but I'm sure enjoying it. Well, I'm enjoying it through the window, I've been in the house for a week with a lung infection and bronchitis, wheee! But got a boatload of meds so that should help; maybe I'll be able to get out for a hike while it's still warm.

[Crankin]

Sounds nice, Catrin. I hope your feet recover.
Hope you feel better, Pax.

[ny biker]

Sounds nice, Catrin. I hope your feet recover.
Hope you feel better, Pax.

+1!!

[Catrin]

My feet got over it in time for the 2.67 mile follow-up hike the next day Sunday, however, I did take off (other than my TaiChi practice) and went to the movies.

[Crankin]

Today we hiked up Little Monadnock Trail, a total of 4 miles RT. We drove about 15 minutes from the inn we stayed at, to the NH state park where the trail started. There was only one other car there, with stickers on it, indicating a serious hiker/climber. The park is called Rhododendron State Park because as you enter the flat loop trail, it is a canopy of rhododendrons. Quite impressive. So, we had the All Trails file to follow and there were OK trail markers, but every once in awhile, we weren't sure where to go. Perhaps it was because there was little evidence of other footprints. There was some crusty snow, some ice (we wore our spikes), and other parts were bare or very wet. A good deal of the trail was along or in shallow running water. Thank God for Gore Tex.
This trail had everything. A stream crossing, steep rocky pieces (short) and lots of elevation for 2 miles up. So, we got to a summit, but it wasn't the real one, but near. We had a great view of Mt Monadnock, but DH wanted to go to the real summit. I was nervous and yelling, as we left the marked state park trails here, although it was marked, but confusing. Right after we started up to the summit, we saw a woman, alone with a dog, who had come in from another spot. We eventually got to the summit, but the view was obstructed by trees.
I used my poles going down and in one place, scrambled down on my butt. It went much faster than I thought it would. Pretty much, I would say this was as technical as what I did in Maine last fall, but it was the getting lost a few times that got to me. DH has a much higher tolerance for this, although we were really never far from the trail, just had to look around for the markers and use the app.
We drove home from there, about an hour and 15 minutes. I am all cleaned up and ready for my son, DIL, and granddaughter to have dinner here, but I am pretty tired. 1885 ft. total ascent.

[Catrin]

Crankin, that sounds just plain wonderful! So.glad you got to do that, and I understand being nervous about leaving the marked trails.

It's a quagmire around here again...sigh.

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[Pax]

Crankin, that sounds just plain wonderful! So.glad you got to do that, and I understand being nervous about leaving the marked trails.

It's a quagmire around here again...sigh.

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Ditto, stepped off the path for a second yesterday and both boots caked up with mud. And I wasn't even going for a real hike, just a short walk and it's a bog again.

[north woods gal]

Crankin', I don't blame you a bit about getting nervous about leaving marked trails. I, for one, have an almost non-existent sense of direction, so getting turned around and lost is usually an ongoing nightmare for me. I just dread it. Haven't met too many people with worse. Then, too, you always hear about reports of people getting lost in parks and so on. This year, no way am I going into our backwoods without a GPS.

[emily_in_nc]

Crankin, your hike sounds like one that we did in the mountains in TN back in the fall -- lots of uphill hiking to a summit, then all the way back down. Definitely a challenge! It sounded very pretty.

BTW, in NC we lived on Monadnock Ridge Road for 10 years. It was a private road, named by the first landowner on it who hailed from New Hampshire. There was an old, unpaved rocky trail on the back of the property lines that used to be an actual road in the days when roads were used by horses only. There were remains of several old cabins on it, and it was informally called Ridge Road, so I guess that helped him name our actual road. Whenever I hear about Mount Monadnock, I think of our place in the beautiful hardwoods of North Carolina's Piedmont!