A fine day in the Chuckanuts

Carol taking a picture of Chuckanut Falls

We had a very small group today, only six Senior Trailblazers, on a beautiful sunny day. I think it was partly because of the location: all winter long we hike close to home in the Chuckanuts, and we were just on these same trails two weeks ago. But never mind, we had a great time. I like the small intimate groups much better than having too many.

Noriko (behind), Carol, Bill, Rich, Al (I took the picture)

You can see the sun streaming through the trees here at Huckleberry Point. This was probably the sunniest spot we had, other than Raptor Ridge, but the Ridge was rather cool and it was too early to have lunch when we arrived there, anyway. Most of this hike is in the trees and with the sun at such a low point on the horizon, we didn't see it much.

Raptor Ridge

This is what Raptor Ridge looked like today, in full sun but with a little bit of a breeze. Check out what it looked like, covered with snow, on our New Years Eve hike. The temperature today was much warmer, and it's obvious that the snow that we had there two weeks ago was an anomaly. I had never seen snow there before.

Pretty lichen

Carol and I both had to stop and take a picture of this beautiful lichen (NB: this is not lichen, but bracken fungi, I was wrong), and then Bill got out his iPhone, too. We decided, after we left the Ridge, to head back to Huckleberry Point for lunch instead of going to the Madrona trail. It was probably a good idea, since as it was we covered more than eight miles and almost 2,000 feet up and down. It would have added a considerable distance to our day's exertions.

Perusing our pictures

Bill took this candid picture of Carol and me while we were trying to decide whether we liked the earlier picture he had taken of the two of us. I always look to make sure the picture is not too unflattering; you know how cameras are. You can see the viewpoint in the distance and the glorious sunshine. Here's the picture that we are looking at. I like it very much.

Carol and me, taken by Bill

And now it's still early, the sun is still up (for another hour), we are gaining more than two minutes of daylight every day, and the day in the Chuckanuts could not have been much better. I did miss my friends who were absent, but we had a lot of smiles, laughter, and sunshine. Oh, and just for fun, I averaged the age of the six of us who were together today: 73.6. Not bad, eh?

:-)