hiking | matching tracksuits

We took a quick drive (well, not quick for the Boy -- it was two hours) over to the Blue Ridge Parkway for an afternoon hike today. The Girl stayed home because she had volleyball practice -- open gym for the club team she's signed with this year. And she doesn't really like hiking. And she's almost 16 and is starting to have her own life -- though it pains me to admit it. How did she get so big so fast?

Be all that as it may, we headed a little further south on the Parkway than we usually go and ended up hiking along ridges with gorgeous views.

K took some pictures with her phone.

We both took some pictures with the Nikon.

And we arrived home exhausted and hungry.

"We really should do this more often," K said.

Babia Gora

Wednesday 13 July 2022

I lived at the base of Babia Gora for seven years and only once tried to reach the summit. Shortly after that, I injured my knee while hiking in the Tatra Mountains. Some time after that, when my knee had healed, I injured the other knee. And so I never made it to the top of Babia. Until today.

Here's some video showing just how windy it was at the top.

Trzy Korony

Sunday 03 July 2022

Climbing mountains is something my mind loves but my body questions. Ever since I seriously injured my knee about 25 years ago hiking in the Tatra Mountains, I’ve been wary of mountains. The way up is not the issue. In fact, it’s a great relief sometimes to be heading up. No, it’s the way down – that crash! crash! crash! against the knees. Almost 190 pounds dropping on knees time and time again.

So when we started our trek up to Trzy Korony today, I was a little concerned about the effect it might have on my knee. I was more concerned when I saw just how steep it was. Fortunately, we all made it fine.

And I'm so exhausted that I can't say much more than that about the whole day.

Saturday Hike

Saturday 09 January 2021

When the Girl hears that we're thinking about a family hike, the reaction is seldom positive. When we're on the hike, there can be a bit of complaining, a bit of whining, a bit of "I'm sooo tired"-ing. We get it: hiking is not her thing. But it's K's thing -- by far her favorite outdoor activity. And I love it, too. Probably not as much as K, but I love K, so I love it more than I probably would without her.

But when her oldest friend asks her if she wants to go on a hike with him and his family, the boots come back looking like this, and there's only positive words about the hike.

I guess we need to invite him along for our next family hike.

From this Summer

Monday 31 August 2020

Another photo from Jones Gap.

Raven Cliff Falls

Sunday 09 August 2020

Today was the last Sunday before the school year starts, so we made the most of it with a hike that was supposed to be 5 miles total but ended up being 8. A lot packed into that sentence.

Starting school. What does that even mean this year? For weeks we've been wondering about what the year will look like. When our average daily new C-19 statewide case number was 100-200, we ended the school year in March and spent the rest of the year online babysitting for the most part. Now our daily numbers are 1,000+, and they have been for weeks. And we're talking about going back to school? It seems like madness. But we've got a Republican governor and a staunch Trump supporter to boot, so science be damned -- let's send those kids back to school. (Our governor pointed out that there's little risk in school-age children dying from this. When asked about the risks to teachers and their families, our fine governor said, "Well, they signed up for the job" -- as if he were talking about police officers or infantry soldiers.)

As for the 8-mile-should-have-been-5-mile hike -- what can we say? We used AllTrails.com to calculate the distance and didn't realize it was only calculating the portion of the hike that was on the red trail, neglecting the portion of the blue and pink trails we had to go on to reach Raven Cliff Falls. One would think that "Raven Cliff Falls Trail" leads to -- guess -- RCF. But it only gets you so far -- the rest is whatever the blue and pink portions were called.