Hike 100 Challenge 2023 - Day 401

With a little digital magic on pictures from another day (the two hollow logs picture was too good not to use) I bring you my Hike 100 Challenge completion for 2023! Lots of people have finished before me this year, but that's OK. I haven't missed a year (although one year I had to do a couple of December hikes to finish!), so this is number 8.

The thing you will notice immediately is that the snow is gone again and the sun is shining! Works for me. This lovely scene is at Dollar Lake.

Some ducks were swimming around. The pictures aren't great- I had to zoom too far, but this is a Bufflehead female and then male.

I love trail like this! The only thing that would make it better would be some leaves on the deciduous trees. But... no bugs, no poison ivy, sunshine, warm but not hot. Can't beat those.

I hadn't realized I would go through this section today. This is new since my first E2E hike, but I did see this on a group hike at the 2019 Celebration.

This is an area where there are a lot of white pine that are over 150 years old.

This is a lot of pictures, but there was a variety of things to see today. The trail then closely follows TwentyTwo Creek. I played with the lighting a bit on this picture to make it look more like what my eyes saw. The camera always seems to "enhance" the reddish brown of the leaves rather than the richness of the greens and browns.

And I discovered there is now a bench in memory of a great trail friend, and a great friend of the trail, Arlen Matson. It wasn't break time, but I sat there a minute to remember Arlen.

I was hiking in shirtsleeves before I finished. The sunlight on conifers and moss was exquisite.

I will confess that the last couple of miles were hard. My knees are rebelling against getting up to speed again, but I did it.

Miles today: 13.2. Total miles so far: 4478.0.

See Mother Nature Had a Relapse