3.9.2011 2 hikes 1 day it was a good day

So today myself and Mr. L went to a place called Ragged Mountain to recon some good hikes.  It was a beautiful day out finally so we went out for 2 hours and found some really good hikes.  For some reason during the hike we followed the Blue trail with a red dot in the middle which we figured based on our map would take us to the Preserve Trail.  Apparently no one told us that today was time vortex day and we would stupid all day because the map and the actual trail didn't match up too well, but no big deal we figured it out.  We were able to navigate because pretty much the whole time we had water on our left so we were able to follow that on the map and use contour lines to figure out which ridgeline we were on, requires much skill.  We found trails marked blue/green, blue/yellow, red, some other kind of red that looked pink and of course the CT blue trail aka Metacomet so we just followed the blue with red dot and then the solid blue back to the cars.  Unfortunately the map at the starting point was pretty worn down and the guide book didn't really tell us which trail markers to follow, but next time we will do a nice long hike around the entire place which will be good.  Overall the hike was great, there were great views, met some climbers on one of the outcroppings we came to, so it was a good hike. 
Later on I went out to West Hartford Res with Mr. V and Mr. M.  We did a pretty long hike around the rez and found a nice spot to go off trail and get in some bushwhacking.  We found some nice outcroppings of rock to try and climb.  Unfortunately the rock was very loose as well as wet because there was a whole of water coming through.  We played around on that for awhile which is always fun and then headed back towards the car.  Here are the pics from the day and some commentary on each one, enjoy I know I did. 

As you can see, well you can't see anything word up

One of many bodies of water we hiked near

Mr.L after conquering Mordor

What I believe to Lamantation MT. in Meriden

Mr. L

Big drop

Pretty cool atleast I think it is

Mr. L looking out over his kingdom

A body of water we didn't realize was there, this threw us off in our nagivation

what does't fit in this picture?

pretty neat rock face we found at the Rez, tried to climb it but as you can see there is alot of loose rock and to the right of
Mr. V there was water seeping through the rock making it dangerous to climb

Mr. V looking for a route up

this me taking pic of what's above me, as you can see to the right is a nice outcropping of rock, and above that another nice outcropping, but as I said there was too much moss and water on the rock to climb it safely, the moss is all that blue stuff

How did that tree get there?

me and Mr. V tring to make eggsalad out of eggs, right in the middle of us is where all the water was coming out of the rock, which also led to the rock there being very unstable, I was able to just pull rock off the face

Mr. V finding an alternate route up, imagine going up that in the winter on snowshoes, that's exaclty what myself and Mr. D did almost every night

again me taking a pic of what's above me, these pics I took from below don't really show how high this was, it was easily 100ft up.  Notice all the moss on the right side of the pic

thought it was pretty cool that that rock was just sitting there like that, to the right is about an 80ft drop

rock face to the left, we found alot of dead trees in this area, Mr. V said it was because of the bees or lack of bees, I must research his claim

looking down from ontop of an outcropping, again this doesn't really show how high up we were

Like I said before overall it was a great day of hiking.  We found alot of cool stuff, and some really good spots to explore.  Everytime I go out into the woods it is nice because you get a sense of how small you really are compared to everything else around you, sometimes you don't realize that when you are at work, or just going about your daily grind.  Example, on the way back from out hike at the rez we were on the blue trail (Metacomet) and we came upon and enormous rock that was definitely out of place.  Mr. V made a comment to the effect how did that get there.  I responded most likely a glacier.  It makes you stop and think about everything that has happened to shape the places around us that we take for granted, the forrests, the deserts, the oceans.  Now I am not going to go all liberal on you and start proclaiming my political views, but I do appreciate nature and it's beauty because no matter how hard man tries to replicate that beauty he will never come close. 

Well till next time later be safe