Frosty Lost Lake

First rays of the sun

Nine Senior Trailblazers went out on a VERY cold and clear day. When I woke this morning, the temperature was 14°F and clear as a bell. After scraping my car windows and heading off to the Senior Center, I wondered if we would have very many people on a day like this, on a rather long hike as well. In the above picture, you might notice a dog on the trail with us, this was Toby who came with his owner, Kathy, who didn't know that we don't allow pets on the hikes. (She'll be back, but Toby won't be.) She met us in the parking lot, along with two regulars, Mikey and Kirk, so off the nine of us went up the old logging road to Lost Lake.

Mostly frozen waterfall

By the time we got to this waterfall on the old road, we were all very warm from the uphill walking and shed some clothes, if you can believe it. It amazes me how exercise makes my internal temperature rise enough to make even subfreezing temperatures feel comfortable. For the first part of the hike, we didn't see any snow or ice, but that changed as we gained elevation. That first picture shows you the first ice and snow we had to deal with.

More ice

At another place with running water, this time along the trail to Lost Lake, we saw evidence of how cold it has been around here lately. The ice sculptures are unusual to me, so my camera had to come out for these. I didn't take as many pictures as usual, because I had to take off my gloves and haul out my phone to do so. Which is, by the way, a new iPhone 7, which I got yesterday. I love it so far, but I kept it close to my body so it wouldn't get disturbed by the extreme cold.

Melanie's cool hardware

Before too long, those of us who had anything to strap to our boots to give us some traction on the snow and ice (which I neglected to get a picture of), made use of them. When we got to our lunch spot, I managed to capture Melanie's brand-new ice cleats, which worked like a charm. I had my less fancy (and less effective) Yak-Trax, but they kept me upright through the worst of it.

Our lunch spot

We had lunch at our usual spot overlooking Lost Lake. This is the first time I've seen the lake completely frozen over, and just before noon we had only a little bit of sunshine, but because the wind wasn't blowing, we managed to stay quite warm. Here you see Chris, Melanie, and Ellen enjoying themselves.

Lost Lake this around noon today

We yearned for that sunshine on us, but because the angle of the sun is so low at this time of year, we mostly enjoyed our lunch in shade. Some previous hikers had been throwing rocks into the lake, obviously, showing that it's not frozen over all that much but still, it's frozen. Just ignore that dark mitten in the top of the picture (grrr!).

First selfie with the iPhone 7

Since I have learned that both the front and back cameras of the new iPhone have been improved, I tried this selfie with my new phone. It is better quality, although there's nothing to do about the subject, it seems. Anyway, by the time we got back to the cars, we had traveled more than nine miles (some instruments said even farther), but we were happy to be back after at least five hours of hiking in the wilds of Bellingham.

It was a good day, for sure, and now that I am home safe and sound (and warm!), I'm glad I went, even if I did take a spill on the ice and tweaked my left knee a little. We Senior Trailblazers are nothing if not resilient.
:-)