Hiking After the Rains

I must confess, this blog post was written a few weeks ago and I forgot to post it.  I just discovered it sitting in my "draft" files.  So, here is my post....a little late.

We experienced a lot, and I mean A LOT of rain over a 24 hour period recently.  I figured the trail would be muddy, but I didn't think it would be as bad as it was.

The rain came down in such torrents, the force of the rain really left the trail a mess.  There were ditches filled with rocks, stones, and sand.  It really tore up the trail itself.  Luckily, I didn't take my dog Finn with me.  It was difficult to walk without twisting knees, ankles etc.  So I took my time.

I took a few pictures of the trail, but the depth of what the rains left behind didn't really show up well in the pictures.  Believe me it was, and still is a very torn up trail.

I finally made it through the bad stuff down to the bottom of the first hill, and this is what I found.

At the bottom of this hill, you can see a sign indicating "long trail" and "short trail".  I usually do the long trail, up that muddy hill beside the steps.  I don't use the steps because they break my stride.  I'd rather climb up the hill itself.  The long trail circles around and comes down a hill on the right of this picture.  Then I cross over to the short trail and go up the short trail hill until it circles around to where I started. 

Here is a close up of the same area...it will be awhile before it will dry up, I'm sure.

I turned around at this point, I didn't feel like swimming. Walked back up the hill, through the torn up portion of the trail and headed down and around the backend of the "short trail" until I was stopped again by water.

It was kind of nice walking through all that...no one else was on the trail. Of course, I had to turn around again and retrace my steps again back to the entrance of the trail.   Here are a few more pictures of the high water.

This next picture shows the lake in the background.  I sometimes see a Great Blue Heron flying low over the water.  So pretty to see...unfortunately, I'm never quick enough to get a photo.