A few members of the Good Girls’ Club got together to enjoy a fall meeting/walk recently. Topics on the agenda included fall colors, sticks, pine cones and cold water. Since Luna no longer attends these meetings, there were no notes taken so we will never know what decisions were made.
Fall is finally here with cold, frosty mornings, occasional fog and sometimes rain although it remains oddly dry and dusty. Fall colors are finally coming on here in the valley. Here are a few images from our hill.
This is my favorite trail, I’m pretty sure. I can return to it multiple times during a hiking season. It does have the very worst road though. It’s a place where the sub alpine larches are enchanting in their early summer greens and amazing when they turn golden in the fall. Pikas are frequently heard and sometimes seen while crossing the talus slopes. Earlier in the year marmots let loose with piercing calls to frighten even the bravest dogs and people too. Now they are underground. The pikas continue to harvest greens to dry in their ‘hay’ piles and then store under the rocks for the long cold winter soon to come.
At the trailhead, the wildfire smoke was thick – we could taste it as well as smell it. But we’d driven all the way so we headed out and gradually, there was less of it but it was always present. While I am not quite ready for winter to set in, it’s the only thing that will quell the wildfires burning in the mountains throughout the northwest.
What a strange fall it’s been. Unseasonably warm and very smoky from wildfires in the mountains. I have not been hiking as much as I’d like to. A friend was driving across the North Cascades so we met at one of the busy trailheads up there to soak in a few fall colors.
Here are a few more images from October. I wish it lasted another month! The weather was perfect and the colors outstanding.
These are from several different outings, all in the Methow watershed.
Luna is adjusting to walking with a brace on her rear left leg. It supports the injured Achilles tendon and allows her leg to move forward rather than swaying out. I think she is happier with it.
My Everyday Photos 