Once again it's been quite some time since my last post. With the new year I plan on being better with posting and all that, wish me luck.
Work has been pretty busy lately, so unfortunately I haven't been able to get out much the past few weeks. Finally this past week I got out and had some much needed fun! On Thursday I got off of work a little early and decided to do a little hiking up one of the local canyons. It was a wonderful day for hiking. It was a little warmer due to the cloud cover, except for in the mouth of the canyon where it was a little more windy. I hiked for a few miles and saw some beautiful scenery along the way. As I've previously mentioned I'm always on the lookout for wildlife and different varieties of useful plants. On this hike I found a wild rose bush with some rose hips from last season. Rose hips are a good source of vitamin C and are actually quite tasty, they almost taste like strawberry fruit leather... Of course I stopped and had a few...
When eating rose hips you want to remember to cut them open and take out the seeds and small inner hairs. The seeds can be toxic and the hairs can irritate the skin. I'm glad I haven't experienced this, but I've heard if the hairs are eaten, then in the next day or two you get something called "itchy bum."
After work on Friday I went up another of the nearby canyons and did some night snow-shoeing. I shoed in about 2 miles and set up camp via headlamp, camp is easy to set up when it consists of only a bivy sack and sleeping bag. Snow-shoeing at night is quite fun, the moon was out and the snow glowing around me, I barely needed my headlamp. I shoed to an area that was pretty exposed, with not a lot of trees. So I picked out one of the bigger trees to act as a wind-break and set up camp underneath. It's a good thing I did because the wind picked up quite a bit during the night. Saturday morning I woke to a wonderful sunrise, gathered what little dry fuel I could and got a fire going with flint and steel. Later I snow-shoed for a few more miles and then headed back home. Overall it was a great weekend full of fun and a lot of snow!
*When you go out, make sure somebody always knows where you are going and when you will be back*
In the past I've always been excited for winter to come and go quickly. I generally prefer heat over cold and it's the coldest season. When it snows it makes it harder to drive and scraping your windshield in the morning is the worst! I've always felt limited on how active I can be outside during the winter, so I've never really enjoyed it. This is the first year in a long time that I have actually been excited for winter, and it already seems like it's on it's way out! LAME!
For all of you who may be feeling the same way as me right now, I decided to put together a few pictures that I took this year during some of my outings so we can enjoy this wonderful season a little bit longer.
This year I was really looking forward to winter and the cold because I had planned various outings and adventures that can only be enjoyed while it is cold and there is snow! This made the season a lot more enjoyable and fun for me, although I still hate scraping my windshield, but whatever.
I wasn't able to do everything I had planned for, but I was still able to get out a few times and thoroughly enjoy myself. My different outings included bird watching migratory birds that we don't see a whole lot of in the other seasons, camping, hiking, snow-shoeing, tracking a group of deer and stalking a flock of wild turkey (I wanted to see how close I could get!), trying out a new pair of gators, identifying wild plants and starting a zero match fire in the snow! I had a lot of fun and I'm hoping for more snow, but if we don't get it then I'll just start planning early for next year. Whichever season it is, I'm always looking for more fun activities to do! What did you do this year that made your winter fun? Leave a comment and let me know!
