Hike # 14 Hills and Horses

Hike # 14: November 1, 2015: 21.9 kms 

This was Valerie's note to Karen and me about the hike she had planned for us this week:

"We'll start at km 6.5 (Creditview and The Grange) and end at km 28.4 on Escarpment Sideroad, between St. Andrew's Road and Mountainview Road. That will be a total of 21.9 km. It will be a 3-map walk -- 14, 15 and 16. Apparently there will be a lot of hills on this hike -- eek!"

Valerie was right.  It was hilly.  My quads and glutes are reminding me of that today.   It was a hike of constantly changing scenery and weather.  There were steep inclines and declines.  One such decline through the Forks of the Credit was steep enough to have a permanently attached wire rope attached to the face of the escarpment.   We enjoyed sunshine in between periods of rain and wind.

For the first time we came upon a closed section of the trail that had not been marked with a suggested re-route.  If you  have ever hiked 20+ km in a day you will know that backtracking is not something taken lightly.  Thankfully Karen's "nothing is stopping me" personality had her looking for a way through the closed off section.  With just a little slipping and sliding (and Valerie learning the splits) we were back on the blazed trail without having to backtrack.

During the long parts of this hike that were along the road I found myself longing to be back on the trail with it's twists and turns.  For some reason I don't like walking along the road where I can see the trail (road) stretch out far in front of us.  I like not knowing exactly where we are going to end up.  I like the changes in the landscape. From open fields, to narrow trails along a deep valley. Up hills and into dark pine and cedar forest to suddenly come in to another forest of nearly bare maple and beech trees with a carpet of wet decaying leaves.

Unfortunately I do not have many pictures that I am willing to share this time. As we set off on our hike and I proceeded to snap pictures as usual it quickly became obvious to me that something was wrong with my camera settings.  Too impatient (and busy walking) to try and find out what was wrong I continued on and only managed a handful of decent shots. The camera will be going in to Henry's for a checkup.

There are a lot of farms with horses in this area.  Of course we had to say hello

This was at the beginning - not a good picture but I couldn't leave it out.