THE FLATIRON, SUPERSTITION MOUNTAINS, ARIZONA
May 2020
10 MAY 2020
Here in Oregon, the sun is shining, the air is warm, birds are singing and the upper elevation snow is just melting. Kirk and I just received our new shoes from REI. (Our previous shoes were destroyed last summer while hiking the Oregon section of the PCT.)
Kirk, Misha and I are ready to hike.
BUT WAIT...Just like everything else, hiking is closed. Hard to deal with if you are one of those people to whom hiking is "essential".
We were just talking about all the people who had planned to hike the PCT this year, wondering what they would do. So, I went to the PCTA website and read their no nonsense message, Stay Off the Trail. They are not wrong. Until all this is over, we who want to hike will just have to live through our photos and our memories.
Last month, just before the country shut down for COVID-19, Kirk and I traveled to Arizona to visit family. We took the rain with us, so we didn't get a chance to do any real hiking. We had planned to climb the Flatiron, a short, but difficult hike with intense elevation gain and some scrambling thrown in for good measure. Instead we walked towards it during a break in the downpour and took some pictures.
February 2020
01 FEBRUARY 2020
As I write this, a relentless, torrential rain, (manifesting as high winds and blizzard snow in the mountains), floods the already sodden ground. This morning, just after I got the dogs in, I heard a sharp crack and watched a long, straight fir tree fall across the length of the neighbor's backyard. Over a hundred feet long, it fell parallel to the house so that other than a section of fence, no one or no thing was damaged.
In other words, it just isn't good hiking weather, and with no new hikes to report, I think back to last summer's epic hike one more time. The memories are a pleasant place to be with winter in full swing outside. And in an attempt to blend past with present, as a kind of New Year's reflection, I wrote the following piece.
Welcome
HELLO
We are Marea, Kirk and Misha, the Wilderness Chick, Dude and Dog respectively. We are not professional hikers and this is not a traditional hiker blog.
We will share our stories with you along with our thoughts and ideas about life and love and adventure.
Misha and I have been hiking together since he was about 6 months old. Kirk joined us a few years ago.
We love the outdoors and we believe that hiking is good for the soul.
Hope you enjoy and Happy Hiking...
Ten Things I Learned While Long-Distance Hiking
On July the 5th, we set out to walk 455 miles from the California border to the Washington border, in thirty days. My daughter dropped us off on a forest road in the middle of nowhere, her little black Veloster leaving puffs of dust behind it as she drove off...
"Wilderness is not a luxury but a necessity of the human spirit."
Edward Abbey
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