Next Hike

The nest hike will be on Saturday, 14th January.

We meet at the Ballpark in Gillies Bay at 10:00am

Last week the day started bright and sunny, but pretty cool.  We did consider going up as high as Mt. Davies if we could drive that far without gettting into too much snow.  There is snow on the ground now, but that Saturday morning there was no snow at all on the ground at Gillies Bay, so we did not realize how much there was higher up.  Anyhow, we decided to start driving and play it by ear, adjusing our hike plan accordingly. By the time we reached the Bell Farm road junction we could see we would not be able to drive much further. We parked at the first wide spot on Hydro East Rd. and continued south on foot.  The snow plough had smoothed off the surface and while we could tell there was ice on the road itself the skim of snow was near perfect for walking without falling.  Just after the summit where the road starts the long descent to the sea we turned off onto an old logging road to head to a lunch spot with a good view and found walking very much more difficult.  The snow surface was a tough crust which sometimes supported our weight and sometimes not.  We reached a viewpoint with some sun but no wind with that fantastic view of the snow covered peaks on the mainland on the far side of the sea far below.

 

After lunch we had time to do some more exploring and reached the top of a rocky ridge after taking an hilarious route in deep snow between some nice looking Christmas trees.  My photo is a shutter delay shot that had me dashing across the road to be included in the picture.  A great hike for the personal memory bank I would say! 

JD.

All happy in the snow!  A mid-winter hike along Hydro East road that had been very nicely ploughed for us to enjoy.