Signs of Spring!

Skunk Cabbage

My first ride in March & it was yet another sunshine, brisk day.   When I asked Jeff @ King Five News about the weather - here was his reply as he stated on last nights news;

"Every month has been warmer than average since February of 2014, Connie. That was the last month we had cooler than average temperatures for the month as a whole."

Regards,

Jeff

This is a far cry from our normal early March weather - not that you'll hear anyone from this side of the state complaining!

Heading to the far side

We decided to head to the far side of the tree farm, on a mission to find another old trail.  It had been a couple years since Linda had ridden this far & I always enjoy it when we go out to the places where we used to ride when things looked oh so different!

Nakashima Barn - north end of the Centennial Trail

We headed down to the old Scott Mainline & there turned south.  The logging roads are still pretty soft, we were trotting & I was on the look out for the holes that had opened up the last time I was here.  Since we didn't see them - maybe someone filled them in?

Creek

Linda said that the creek above used to be full of Salmon - with Eagles sitting on the trees to feast...   I'm sure it was a sight to see!  We kept going - happy that the days are long enough that we could go as far as we needed to & still get back before the day was done!

Linda leading Count

We made our goal & found what we wanted to find!  We can't tell you where - it's a total secret - but we were happy that even washed out & in bad shape - it was still there!  Now - we were about as far away from where we started as we could get!  Time to start back & we wanted to do the lower loop, which again, Linda hadn't seen for a while.  When we started up - Linda asked if I recognized it?   No, not really - but it was only the second time I'd taken it the direction we went.  Linda said;  "It's the hill where we used to let Eb & Alexi Go!"  That put me in flashback mode - of the two of us - blazing sunshine, open hillside, gradual uphill grade & flying along side-by-side!  It was really hard to reconcile that scene from the past - (Over 20-years past!)  - with the now overgrown & narrow wooded trail.  We are lucky indeed to still be doing what we love & still riding together - with all those years of trail dust behind us & ongoing plans for more ahead!

Three Fingers

Back at the top of the first long climb & even on Farah - looking for Food...   I used the zoom on the new camera to get the above photo.  The day was never really warm on the shady side of the mountain, I had my coat on over my vest all day!  Now though - we'd been out over five hours & it was cooling off as we rode around back to the west side & into the rapidly dropping sunshine!

My first Salmonberry blooms!

What a bonus to find the Salmonberry starting to bloom at the top of the hill!  A sure sign that Spring is around the corner!