vituperation

Every year at Christmas, there’s a bit of a tradition around our house. We get up, open presents, then Robyn makes mandarin orange muffins and I go for the official Christmas Day hike. This year, it started raining around noon on Christmas Eve, and continued to rain at our house almost constantly until about ten o’clock yesterday morning.

I decided to cancel the traditional Christmas hike because it was so nasty out.

Until eleven o’clock, that is, when I realized being cooped up in the house was far worse than anything the mountain could throw at me. So I put on some BDUs and long-sleeve t-shirt and dug my old hiking boots out of the corner of the garage. God forbid in get my nice bright yellow Cascadia trail shoes muddy.

After a brief—and quite nerve wracking—inspection of the boots for black widows (I found one in the garage a couple of weeks ago when we were cleaning it), I pulled them on and headed for Monte Sano. The hike was quite the experience, and really different from normal in that there was water in all sorts of places where there normally isn’t. And it was still raining there.

Of course I took my new camera, and now I give you a photographic rendition of Christmas Hike 2005.

The Wagon trail meanders down the gentle slope of the mountain.
Please note that this is the trail, not a streambed.

In the distance, the summit where the Waterline trail peaks
is clothed in a low cloud.

This is the first half of Fagan Creek, normally bone dry in the summer
and a trickle in the winter. I crossed it on the rocks.

This is the second half of Fagan Creek. There’s a small island in the middle,
where I was standing when I took this picture. Fortunately, my hiking boots are
waterproof so my feet only got a little damp walking through this.

I almost busted my ass once, though. I’m sure my windmilling arms made quite the sight.

This is normally a dry bed. I’ve never seen even a single drop of water here.

A closer view of a small cascade.

At one point on the Alms House trail, water poured forth
from a hole in the mountainside. It was pretty damn cool.

The normally bone-dry Waterline trail, just where the climb gets good.

A stream on the Railroad trail that’s normally a trickle. You can see
where they’ve put a bridge over the stream at the top of the picture.

Standing on that bridge and looking upstream.

Looking downstream from the bridge.

Despite getting wet and muddy, and the occasional slip-n-slide parts, the hike was well worth it, just for the opportunity to see the mountain in a way I never have. Strangely, there were no other people out hiking in the rain on Christmas Day. I’m not sure why.

Mister Boogers and Tom Cullen share a tender moment in daddy’s lap last night.

Tom Cullen and Sugarbutt come to help dad paint the computer room this morning.

And voila, done and put back together by noon. I’m getting good at this.

Last weekend, I painted my bedroom. I really like this color.
It’s hard to tell because the room was dark, but it’s a nice shade of diarrhea green.