Today's Hike

Today (4/18/2020) Ms. blue Eyes and I hiked up a mountain. Not a hill, mind you, but a real, live damn mountain. We'd made the decision to do it last week and it was somewhat on a whim, though I'd thought about climbing it ever since I first saw it. Looking at the mountain, it was obvious we'd have three crests to peak on the way to the top, which meant that between the crests, there would be declines. We chose what I thought would be the easiest first route, a route I chose because I could see donkeys walking along what were surely trails that they'd made over the years. We quickly found the trail up to the first crest, which was indeed a well-used trail and followed it to the top of the first peak. Once there we continued to follow the donkey trail that led down and then back up to the second peak. That part took about twice as long as getting to the first peak, but the scenery was great as we came across trees and more green grass. We eventually crested the second peak and the rocks, grass and flowers seemed to become prettier...but not as pretty as they'd be at the top!

After about 10 minutes, we started hiking up to the third crest. This was probably the most fun part of the hike, as along the way we saw a herd of 10 donkeys that included a baby donkey that stayed tight to its mother and older sibling. A picture of them is included herein as well. It was at this point that Ms. Blue Eyes checked our elevation and we were at about 1900'. Soon after moving past the donkey family, we heard a clatter and looked up to see a mule deer doe running. We'd surprised her while she was bedded down and she bolted UP the rocks and ran over the other side of the third crest we were climbing to. We were nowhere near as agile and capable as she was, but we eventually made it to the top of the that crest and the view from up there was amazing! The rock at the end of the finger immediately caught my attention because it looked out over the city and local reservoir. I had Ms. Blue Eyes pose on the rock at the end of the peak and took several pictures of her posed on this rock. They turned out great (duh!) and the first picture on this post is one of them. Just down the opposite slope that we'd come up were many, many poppies, the first poppies of the hike, in fact. We stopped to admire them and then started back down the mountain. The climb down was easier than going up as we now knew that donkey trails were all over the mountains (you just have to look) and the vegetation that we did have to plow through was not daunting, at all. All in all, the hike took two hours and 37 minutes and I think that if we did it again, we could do it two hours, given what we have learned. Having said that, there are many other hikes worth undertaking and the temperatures will soon be in the 90s making hiking up mountains a terrible idea. Fortunately for us, the beach and higher (cooler mountains) are just an hour away so we have plenty of opportunity for journeys in the months to come.