Bad Weather is Good for..

Hiking and Photography! Really!

The NOAA said "Winter Storm Warning" for my area. For the area we had planned on going was "Winter Weather Advisory".

Now what exactly did that mean?
Well.
For my place it meant. Thundersnow, lightening, hail, rain, snow, more rain, more snow, and then sleet. And then Freezing Rain.

I woke up when the lightening and thunder occurred. It was loud and incredible. Then came the hail. 

Well, never mind that. I met up with the Kenosha Crew and we ate breakfast while deciding on where to 'adventure' first. We got into our Subaru's and headed to Mirror Lake.
I'd always wanted to go there and hadn't been there yet.

When I bought my annual sticker for my car my friends came in with me. The lady behind the counter sort of gave us a funny look when we picked up a trial map.
We gleefully announced we were going hiking!

I'm pretty sure she locked the door behind us.
Nah...she didn't. Maybe just radioed the rangers about the crazy folks in two Subarus.
We drove on the crunchy slippery roads with a mist of freezing sleet/rain/mist coming down.
We found an area that was open for parking and proceeded to put on hiking gear.

"Look mom...dad! I ran down the log and got out here!"
Mom and dad: "Be careful!"

"Whoops! Hey my boot IS waterproof!"

And we went on hiking.

And we went exploring. 
Do you know what it is like to feel like you have a whole State Park all to yourself? No? 
Well we did. The mist came down and when a bit of a breeze picked up we found places to get out of the wind.

I followed an old staircase that lead to nowhere and found an interesting view that looked out over the frozen lake.

However, the view straight down where my friends had been was just as interesting.

And roots. I like roots, so gnarly, so sturdy, so intriguing!

We headed down into the 'gorge' under the Ishnala Bridge and sort of wandered around exploring. Everyone did their own thing.

And that was just the first day of our 3rd annual Ice Hike. We were pretty sure that winter would have left us, but fortuneatly Mother Nature to quote my friend Daryl, "Did not disappoint."

I wonder if the lady in the Admissions office breathed a sigh of relief when we drove out. 

Little did she know that we were going to do it all again the next day, only someplace else.