2016: Post 13 – Almost went for a paddle today

The forecast for this weekend is very good for kayaking and plans have been made to paddle on Sunday.   Last night I thought I might go for a paddle this morning as well, but when I woke up I decided to go for a walk in the woods instead.  

There is a spot that I plan to do an overnight hammock camping trip this summer and I wanted to go scope out the area for hanging possibilities.  Also, earlier this year I had purchased some poles for my Warbonnet Superfly hammock tarp and decided to bring the tarp and poles along to see how the poles would work out.  So I filled up my daypack with some gear, put on my hiking boots, grabbed my walking poles, and jumped in the car.

We had forty-nine centimetres of snow that fell Tuesday night and Wednesday.  Lot's of it has melted over the last couple days but there was still a good bit of it on the trail... 

There were fresh foot prints on the trail when I started but within no time the owner of them had turned back.  I knew once I reached the summit of the hill there would be much less snow to contend with and I pushed on.

There wasn't any wind to speak of and the water on this pond was very still...

Further along the trail I found another set of tracks that I recognized right away.  The tracks belonged to Stewart, but it has been quite some time since I have seen them...

There was one spot where I did lose the trail with all the snow that was around.  You'd think it would be impossible to lose a trial with sign's like this posted....

I trudged about a little bit and picked up the trail again.  After walking for nearly an hour, with a couple rest stops included, I was where I wanted to be...

The temperature was 0 Celsius when I left the car, but it was sunny and the snow in the tree branches was melting so much it was as if it was raining when I was in the trees...

I had taken my rain jacket with me in anticipation of needing it and had to pull it on to prevent myself from getting wet and chilled in the `rain` before I started setting up my tarp.

After I had my tarp set up I broke out the poles and added them.  The poles are used to lift out the sides of the tarp instead of using side tie-outs.

Lot's of extra room inside...

I was pleased with the pole set-up, but wished I would have brought my hammock along too... I could have set it up under the tarp and had myself a little snooze.  Oh well, no matter.  It was time to boil some water and have my breakfast of tea and banana bread.

I mucked about for a while after I finished breakfast, scoping out several locations to hang hammocks in the area.  I identified a couple more locations that would require little to no brush clearing.  

I dismantled my morning camp set-up and packed up.  My tarp was wet from the snow melting off the trees and, not wanting to get my pack contents wet, I put it into it's stuff sack and hung it on the outside of my pack.

I began my walk back after having a final look around to make sure all that was left were my footprints. I walked for a little way and then turned back to look at where I had just been...

It took a little less time to walk back to the car then it did to walk in since I now knew where all of the trail was. 

I was very pleased with my little walk in the woods this morning.  Now I just have to decide when the Great Newfoundland Hammock Hang of 2016 will take place...