Saturday, May 28, 2005
Spring in Kettle Moraine
A couple weekends ago Claudia and I enjoyed a beautiful day in Kettle Moraine State Park Southern Unit in Wisconsin. We were planning on camping, but the unpredictable spring weather made us change our plans to just do a day hike. We chose the most challenging loop in the Southern Unit, the Blue Loop in the Nordic Trails area, 9.2 miles total.
Many of the trees were just leafing out but there was plenty of green to enjoy. In the image below, Claudia inspects some oaks along the trail as some trail runners go past. The day we were there a 50-kilometer (30-mile) race was taking place on the Nordic Trails and the nearby Ice Age Trail. And we thought we were taking a long hike!
At about 1:15 PM we were approaching the end of our hike which was where the race ended as well. As the runners came by we encouraged them by telling them the end was near and congratulating them on making it. But one guy just stopped right next to us, told us he'd been running since 6:30 AM and wouldn't even be that far if he hadn't taken some shortcuts in the trail! He seemed cheerful despite his exhaustion. Many of the runners looked surprisingly unaffected by the long run.
It was a cool, breezy day, but the sun did show itself much of the time and there weren't any bugs to bother us. We enjoyed hiking through and identifying the formations left by glaciers thousands of years ago. The image below is of our lunch spot in a nice meadow on a flat ridge with some trees protecting us from the wind.
We finished the day by visiting the museum at the park headquarters and checking out a section of the Ice Age Trail and one of the shelters on it for a future backpacking trip. More fun to come!
Many of the trees were just leafing out but there was plenty of green to enjoy. In the image below, Claudia inspects some oaks along the trail as some trail runners go past. The day we were there a 50-kilometer (30-mile) race was taking place on the Nordic Trails and the nearby Ice Age Trail. And we thought we were taking a long hike!
At about 1:15 PM we were approaching the end of our hike which was where the race ended as well. As the runners came by we encouraged them by telling them the end was near and congratulating them on making it. But one guy just stopped right next to us, told us he'd been running since 6:30 AM and wouldn't even be that far if he hadn't taken some shortcuts in the trail! He seemed cheerful despite his exhaustion. Many of the runners looked surprisingly unaffected by the long run.
It was a cool, breezy day, but the sun did show itself much of the time and there weren't any bugs to bother us. We enjoyed hiking through and identifying the formations left by glaciers thousands of years ago. The image below is of our lunch spot in a nice meadow on a flat ridge with some trees protecting us from the wind.
We finished the day by visiting the museum at the park headquarters and checking out a section of the Ice Age Trail and one of the shelters on it for a future backpacking trip. More fun to come!
