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I had a great weekend this past. Saturday was a hike up to the Snow Hole near Petersburgh in the Taconic mountain range with Joe Levy and Karen Traite. I’ll be eternally grateful to them for getting me off my butt and back on a hike. It’s been nearly a decade since I’ve gone on a nature walk like Heather and I used to do, with camera in hand.
The Snow Hole hike was a good one, too. Perfect for an older naturist who hasn’t been on a real hike in too long. There were steep parts, but they only lasted long enough to make you think, “I may have to sit down in a second.” Just as I would get desperate, I’d look up and the trail would level out a few strides ahead. It would stay level long enough for me to catch my breath, then dip down or climb up again for a short period. While I was tired when we came back to the trailhead four hours after starting, I wasn’t about to fall over.
Along the way we spotted a red-tailed hawk soaring in the thermals over a small blue-berry infested meadow (which isn’t as good as it sounds when the berries are only 2mm unripe bumps). I tried to get some good pics of the hawk, but he was too fast, and all I could get were silhouettes.
The Snow Hole itself was only slightly disappointing. A deep crevice in the rocks, the Hole stays cool year round because of the thermal mass of the rocks that form its walls and the abundant shade of the trees above. Sometimes you can even find snow in early summer. We did not, and that was the only disappointing part. The hole was colder than my basement, a good 50° if I had to guess, and very damp. There was gorgeous moss everywhere, not to mention graffiti from the late 1800’s. A couple of birds flitted around, and the bugs did not. After about ten minutes down there, Karen was even getting cold.
So, we climbed out of the hole (no mean feat) and had lunch after which Karen found a geocache near her impromptu toilet. We had quick read and signed our names, lamenting the lack of snow. Then we headed back down to the car.
Here’s an album* of pictures from the walk:
Have a great week!
Q
*All photos not showing people are released under a Creative Commons 3.0 noncommercial, share-alike, attribution license. Photos of people are ©2010 Quentin Hudspeth and may not be distributed or used without my written permission.
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