Weekend hiking - forests, caves, and snow

[Mentor]

Hi all,

Toronto is a few hours away from having the first snow-free November in 162 years. Sigh (I like winter!). Fortunately, the weather is a bit more seasonally appropriate a few hours to the north, on Blue Mountain, where I spent the weekend hiking. I covered quite a few km, walked through some mixed terrain, and generally had a great time. In addition to getting in some serious trail time, I wanted to practice my fire-making, make a batch of char cloth, and begin replacing the survey tape markers on my new snowshoe trail (which I have been working on since Spring) with proper blazes. It was a busy weekend!

Pics:

Hiking along the Bruce Trail, near Metcalfe Rock

Views of the cliffs

Upwards!

A bit of sunshine starting to poke through the clouds

My belt knife for this trip, a JK Hudson Bay 7”. Came in handy for trail maintenance and cutting / splitting wood (a baton was involved).

I used my JK firekit to build a small fire, and ‘cooked’ a batch of char cloth. The cloth is this case was 100% cotton squares, cut from an old t-shirt. It took a few minutes to get the fire hot enough, but once I had a base of coals going, everything came together nicely. Now I just need to figure out how to squeeze this into my already-stuffed PSK fire kit.

The setting sun through the trees

More to follow ...

 

[Mentor]

Saturday, hiking to the Singhampton Caves for a bit of late fall cave wandering:

Ruby, my mountain goat (cleverly disguised as a yellow lab). Seriously, this dog can scramble! She loves to climb up hills, crawl through caves, and walk perilously close to precipices. Here she is leading the way up the slope that leads into the Singhampton Caves.

Awesome rock pillar

Views from the caves

As you can see, the cave walls are covered in some amazing moss. It gives them a bit of a subtropical feel, even in the late fall. As I was walking through this time, I noticed some odd clumps of soil near some of the cave walls. When I investigated (read: looked up), I found that some $%#@ing ignorant jerks had decided to treat the cave walls like their personal climbing gym. They had drilled anchor points into the rock and scuffed loose large patches of vegetation. In my opinion, being an outdoors enthusiast - especially in such an amazing natural setting - means treating nature with respect and attempting to minimize one’s impact on the environment. For some, it seems to mean treating nature like a cheap amusement park. Ah, well.


More pics to follow!

 

[Mentor]

It started to snow on Blue Mountain late Saturday night, and it was still coming down this morning. The covering was not very deep, but it was the first snowfall of the season, so I was excited to get out for a hike. I stuck to family land, as I wanted to do some work on my snowshoe trail.

Here’s a shot of the trail. It’s difficult to see with the snow, but the trees along the path have white rectangle blazes sprayed on them. I have a red stencil - the silhouette of a sparrow - that I will be spraying inside the rectangle in order to make the trail more visible (a project for next weekend). My JK Hudson Bay came in handy for cutting up downed trees and the odd protruding branch. I was ladened with gear on this outing - cans of spray paint in my pack bottle pouches, stencil in one hand, step ladder in the other (necessary - give it a month and the snow will be approaching the bottom of the blazes), and a nice big belt knife. Great way to spend a morning!

A few close-up shots of the snow. Nothing spectacular, but the first snowfall of the year always gets me excited.

Thanks for looking, and all the best!

- Mike

 

[coote]

Great !! Is that some form of limestone? Thanks, Coote.

 

[jca21]

sweet pics dude, i gotta head east some day.

 

[Mentor]

Coote, it's part of the Niagara Escarpment, which has a limestone (dolostone) caprock and a shale base.

Cheers!

- Mike

 

[coote]

We have some good caves in a few areas down here. The limestone Im used to looks a bit different to your pictures, but I can see a similarity. Thanks.

 

[mneedham]

Mentor - Great pics. Man, I love those Jks of yours:thumbup:

 

[markhait]

Great pics!!! I used to go SCUBA diving at Tobermory and its absolutely beautiful there.
The waters clear and cold and the air is crisp and clean...just the way I like it!
Would like to go more, but U.S. customs is such a pain in the A$$ that I tend to stay away from Canada...its sad!

 

[RoyalM]

Nice looking time in the woods mate.

As a fellow snow lover i'm crossing everything for a good blanket this year.

 

[Switchblade61]

Nice pics!
I would check that stump in the last photo for fatwood...

 

[Mentor]

Nice pics!
I would check that stump in the last photo for fatwood...

Ha! I spent hours tromping around, looking for a decent fatwood stump. Wouldn't it be ironic if the one stump I decided to photograph turned out to be an overlooked source of fatwood? I'll check next time I'm up!

Best,

- Mike

 

[Mistwalker]

Awesome photos! Looks like a beautiful area to wander around in.

.

 

[Iboschi]

Spectacular trip. Displays such as this really give me the vicarious experience I need when work has me "tied down". Thanks for sharing the wonderful landscape!

 

[tonym]

Beautiful area and you took some really good pictures bro!

Thanks for sharing them.

 

[Mentor]

Thanks guys,

Iboschi, I can definitely appreciate the 'vicarious wilderness experience' thing. Often, when I'm buried in papers and running from meeting to meeting, I'll log on to W&SS and stare at someone else's campfire or view. Definitely one of the benefits of hanging around here!

All the best,

- Mike

 

[mtnfolk mike]

great pics Mike...:thumbup: i wish we had winters like that here, instead of all this sun..

 

[Bolt-action bultema]

Go east for a few hours, you can find winter in cali

 

[John G]

Terrific pics Mentor. Very calming. You've got a good eye for framing. :thumbup: