There are adventure hikes and then there are blue-jean hikes. Most of the time I love adventure hikes. These are new trails I have never been on where I have to stay switched on at all times, diligently checking my map and watching for trail junctions. You have no idea what to expect on a new trail and every part of it is like slowly unwrapping a meaningful gift. This was not an adventure hike. This was what I call a blue-jean hike. What is that you ask? Well a blue-jean hike, is exactly like pulling on your favorite worn-in pair of beloved blue jeans. You know the trail like the back of your hand. You could probably do it blind-folded. You never even need to take a map with you. There is nothing unexpected. You can see the entire hike in your mind. This allows you to completely switch off your brain and hike on auto-pilot.
Sometimes in life, you just need a blue-jean hike! Sometimes you just need to turn your mind off. That is what I chose for this hike. We had just received a Valentine's Day snow storm the day before my hike. I figured with all the fresh snow, there was no need to drive to the mountains, but instead I would simply go to a favorite blue-jean hike that is about 20 minutes from my front door in the Columbia River Gorge separating Washington and Oregon States. Now, this can be a popular hike from the main trail head. But if you know me at all, you know that I have found a back door way to get to this peak so I can avoid that main trail. I have combined 2 different trail systems plus an equine route to make an epic figure eight loop hike. There are two particular sections of this hike where I have never, ever seen a human. I love that! Of course going the back door route makes this longer. It is generally between 13-17 miles depending on which trails you combine and you may have to climb two separate peaks on the same hike. There are so many trails all intersecting throughout this region that I can tell you it took me numerous hikes to explore all of them and piece the whole system together in my mind. But now, I can just unfold my legs and let my feet start walking. I never know quite which way I will choose until I am there, standing at a trail junction.
The forested section of the hike was beautiful with snow all around beneath us and blue sky above us. The sun kept peaking through the trees and playing peekaboo. Normally I would be very cautious of hiking through snowy forests as every gap in the trees looks like a trail and can get you lost really fast, but not a blue-jean hike. There is no worry about getting lost at all when I know a trail system this well. Despite the sun, it was actually fairly chilly. As we climbed higher, we could feel the temperatures dropping and the wind picking up. When I started to wonder what the temperature was, I found icicles that told me it was still cold even though I was sensing Spring in the air!
We could see our breath with each exhale and were glad to be climbing higher and higher to maintain our body temperatures through the exertion. As the sun was hitting the tree tops though, snow and ice was melting and dropping onto our heads and shoulders. Even Josie's ear hair started to show the soaking we were taking. I was happy for my lined stocking cap for sure.
It didn't take long before we broke out onto the ridge that was our goal for the day. As expected and just like always, the views were truly stupendous. It is the kind of place that takes your breath away any time of the year, but winter is extra special up here. Nova was the first to pose for photos of course, as any good hiking Princess should do!
You can see all the fresh snow covering the peak we are standing on and the ridges across the Gorge. But in the distance you can also see the tiny peak of Mt. Hood standing to attention south of us. Once Josie got up to this spot, her first priority was to get into her watch position and survey everything. She is always, always watching everything intently. I doubt anything is missed from her steely eyesight!
In the distance over her left shoulder you can see the Columbia River running down the Gorge to the Pacific Ocean. The line crossing over the river there is the Bonneville Damn. Josie found that she could watch boats in the river, big trucks along the highway below and even trains moving up and down the Gorge as we lounged out on our little peak for the afternoon.
If there is one thing that I have taught these girls well, it is that we always need to pray and thank God for incredible times like this. There is no better place in the world to talk to God than on a peak in His creation I always say. Here are the girls doing just that.
We tried hard to ignore the cold wind blowing powder up from one side of the peak to the other in front of us. After eating a cold lunch (not sure why I didn't bring my thermos on this one!!), we took a few more pictures before something completely unexpected happened on my blue-jean hike. Just when I thought how nothing unexpected ever happens!
All of a sudden we discovered that a new friend had joined our party. At first Josie the Wolf wanted to eat our new friend and I had to explain that this was in very poor taste! We can't just eat everyone who is different than we are. In fact, we needed to invite him to dine with us! She didn't particularly like this idea, as lunch for him was going to be her whole bag of dog treats!
This was the first Raven who came to see us. He was sleek and shiny and so much larger up close than you expect. But what did me in was when I spoke to him, he lifted his wings up on either side of his body and cooed a sweet sound while flapping both wings at me just like a baby bird does to his Mama. He had me and he knew it. I would have given him anything he asked for! While digging into my pocket for the treat bag, he became excited and started to scream. This was not a scream like my parrot at home does when I vacuum. The best way I can describe this sound is to make you think of a movie. So you remember in the movie Jurassic Park when the Velociraptor made that loud screaming sound. That is exactly what this guy sounded like. It surely made us all just freeze and stare at him. Who knew that kind of a sound could come out of a guy like this! I am convinced that the sound guys on that movie invented the Velociraptor scream by hanging out with Ravens. Just as I started to feed my first friend, our second friend arrived for the party.
These guys were so talented that we had to play with them for some time. They could catch treats in mid-air and dig them out of the powder below. They never missed a one. Both Nova and Josie could walk up to within a few feet of them and they confidently knew they would be fine. I repeatedly told them how beautiful they were and that I was in love with them.....appropriate for the day after Valentine's I thought! I think Nova was getting a little jealous however when I suggested that we name them Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. She didn't want me bringing them home with us.
I could have stayed up there until dark playing with our new friends and soaking in the expansive views, but the cold started to get the better of us. When I could physically see my legs shivering violently and hear my own teeth chattering despite all my layers of clothing, I knew we had to start the descent back to the truck. The wind was just too fierce up here to combat the cold for much longer!
Now, you are probably wondering what happened to my newest gear idea for snow hiking with the Wolf. I did have something new with me that I was anxious to try out. On last week's hike, I had done some trail running in the snow and it was perfect. It let the Wolf think she was pulling me in an iditarod race, but allowed me to maintain control of my feet; something that has turned out to be more important to me than I realized. The problem with this arose when I post-holed my leg while running in just snow boots and risked having a broken limb miles from the trailhead. When I got home that night, I started to search out snow running to see what else was out there. Well it turns out that people like to run marathons on snow in some places of our country. Who knew?? So they make these specialized running snow shoes just for this! These are super light weight, don't have all the spikes or metal built in like a climbing snow shoe and are curved on both ends to simulate a rocking and running motion even just standing in them. They also are very slender so you don't get that bow-legged issue like normal snow shoes give you after many miles in them. I figured these new snowshoes were perfect to keep me from post-holing while running with the girls. I strapped them on while standing on this peak. I figured it was all down hill from here!
I tried to show Josie but she just kept looking for our Raven friends. I think she was still holding a grudge that all her treats were gone and she would have to wait for the truck to get any more.
We took off running down the trails waving goodbye to Rosencrantz and Guildenstern and watching the sun drop into that lower position in the sky telling us we better hurry if we didn't want to be digging the flashlights out of our pack. The snowshoes did amazing! They stayed tightly strapped on and took no time at all to get used to. Running in them was very natural and they indeed kept me above the powder. There were times when the Wolf wanted to run faster than I could go with my heavy winter pack, but all in all, this was surely the best winter gear compromise for her and I yet. That being said, I think I want to try them again in deeper powder and perhaps in combination with the Ski-Skates on hills to get the best of both worlds. So we will see how that goes soon! Stay tuned! Winter is not done with us yet!
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