Saturday afternoon: Hiking at Flaming Geyser Park with Lisa...

[elfs]

The Flaming Gashole!

I had long ago made a date with lisakit to go hiking in Flaming Geyser, a gorgeous little park that's just a short drive south east of where I live. The park is in a little rural section right outside of town. I met Lisa at her home and she chose to drive, so we took the Interstate south and then 18 East, and soon she was driving me through some of the most beautiful country we have in easy reach while she told me wonderful tales of her own rural childhood in the land through which we drove.

Too cute

I think nature makes baby animals so cute so we won't eat them too soon. This is one of the many critters we passed on the way to the park: horses, cows, and of course llamas.

We reached the park and chose the riverside path. We walked up even as the rain started up, and she told me that the river claimed the lives of stupid kids who innertubed it at the worst times of year.

Lisa's hard-core. She walked barefoot. It was fifty Farenheint (ten centigrade), it was raining, it was muddy, and she was trudging through it all with ten toes to the wind. She even stepped on a slug. I mean, my doc told me to try barefooting it more often, but with the rocks and the slugs I think shoes were more my style that afternoon.

Moss on Ridge Path

After doing the riverside trail, we decided to do the harder High Ridge trail, which took us up the hillside and into the deeper woods, filled with moss and slugs and spiders. It rained harder; I was grateful for my hat. Lisa had a harder time of it that I did, but my knee was killing me by the time we were both done with the whole trail. We drove pretty much straight home, and I was grateful for a chance to grab ibuprofen and hit my legs with the shower massager too darned hot when I got back to my house.

I took about eighty photos, and only picked out seven that I liked when I was done. You can see them at my flickr set of the hike.

Comments

[urox.livejournal.com]

So long as Japan continues to produce things, people will eat cute things, from cute containers, using cute utensils.

[damiana-swan.livejournal.com]

Barefooting is fun! satyrblade is corrupting me--he barefoots pretty much any time he isn't teaching (including walking around downtown) and a couple years ago he hiked most of the Appalachian trail barefoot.

It takes a while to get used to it because you walk differently barefoot than you do with shoes on so you're using your leg muscles differently, but as long as it's not terribly cold for long periods of time, it feels absolutely amazing.

[lisakit.livejournal.com]

You forgot to mention that as a Pac NW native I grew up running around barefoot, sometimes even in winter, and swimming in glacial runoff. Granted I can't swim in near ice water anymore, but 50 degrees farenheit is nothing. Heck, it felt like a nice warm spring day to me. It really is much easier for me to walk barefoot, and being out in the woods like that energises me, which is why I didn't notice I was hurting so much until that evening and the next day. I really need to do more of that. It's way too good for my soul. I really enjoyed the company too.

The pics turned out great! Nice perspective on the hillside stream there, looks like it was part of the actual river.

Oh yah, and for your other readers, the cute little geyser used to go as high as 12' when I was a kid in the late 70's to early 80's. It's amazing how much the place has changed over the years, yet kept it's incredible beauty.