Sunny Sunday snowshoe celebration

Temperatures climbed out of the single digits today from where they have been stuck since Christmas, into the 15-20 degree range. A Sunday blessing. We celebrated this afternoon with a snowshoe hike at some DNR land up by Forest Lake. We all had some pent up energy from a couple weeks of weather that does not encourage outdoor recreation, though I think Lola most of all.

As we hiked away from the car, we could feel a breeze at our back and Katie remarked it would be in our faces on the way back. Our hike took us along the edge of a woods of mixed hardwoods with rolling corn fields to our left. As we trekked along, the sun came out and we reveled in the feeling of it on our faces. The woods narrowed and then jutted out like a peninsula into a large wetland. When the woods terminated, we set out across the marsh, aiming for more woods on the other side.

We didn’t make it that far. About halfway across it suddenly became apparent that the dog was flagging. While she had a lot of energy from not getting much exercise, apparently she was also out of shape. She was no longer bounding through the snow and when I called her back she struggled along slowly, pushing through the chest-high snow. Since she’s not smart enough to just slow down, we turned back.

The breeze was on our faces like Katie predicted, but the sun and blue sky was out too, and that more than made up for it.