Okay I will admit it, I have been having
so much fun hiking that I've had very little free time to write here! I apologize to everyone, but my plan is to redesign this blog and rather than a hike-by-hike entry, I will take the time to do recaps as I can- this may cover more than one hike at a time, it may cover hiking equipment I love, or it may cover other topics of interest. In other words, I am opening up my options here in order to kick my hiney into gear... ;)
Update on me:
Well I really pooped out over last fall and winter. I caught pneumonia at the end of the summer last year and it really, and I mean
REALLY kicked me down. I literally am still not a 100% recovered (my inhaler stays in my pack now), but I decided to finally bite the bullet late this winter and get back out there- and I've been having a blast ever since!
It's hard to believe that it has been two years this month that I really started hiking again. When I started, I promised myself new gear for every year that I hike. The first year I bought a new pack and new boots and a few odds and ends. This year a went a little (a little? ha!) crazy (have I mentioned how much I
LOVE REI?). New pack, yes- but lots of other fun gear and all new hiking duds too- I'm proud to say that my old ones were
way too big! Yay! All told, over the last two years I have lot 80 pounds- and best of all?
I kept it off! Even over my "lazy" winter, I did not gain back any of the weight (and that is some accomplishment considering Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas occurred in there!).
My knee is holding up okay. The forced rest didn't do it much good- but I have been taking some joint supplements (once a day and then an extra dose before hitting the trail) that have really made a difference. We hiked on Tiger Mountain on Sunday in the blowing cold and rain, and managed to take a wrong turn that turned our hike into a shorter version of itself, and I was one of the few who wimped out at the parking lot rather than continuing onto another trail because the cold bites soooo deeply into my joints, especially my knee and hips. I apparently should have dosed up with some ibuprofen before hiking that day.
I
am proud to say that in spite of my illness, I
did manage to reach (and even surpass) my goal of 100 miles last year! Whoo-hoo! I'm not reaching for mileage this year, but I
am reaching for elevation gain (oh geez!).
Update about PNW Leisure Hiking:
Well a few things have happened on that front... I absorbed another group, the Easygoing Hikers (the organizer contacted me because he could not find someone to take over, and asked me to do so), jumping our numbers up to nearly 500 members. These are
not active numbers, and I have not done a purge for nearly 6 months. Typically, every few months I send out emails to members who have not logged into Meetup to gauge their interest. I ask that they either 1) log in for a second or 2) send me a message indicating they are still interested, otherwise I remove them from the group. They are of course always allowed to rejoin (with very, very few exceptions), but I would like my numbers to record an accurate member count for planning purposes- besides the fact that I would like people joining to see a realistic count as well. Because of the lack of group activity due to my pneumonia, I decided to wait until we'd been running strong again.
We tend to post at least one hike per weekend- two if I can manage it. I want to be out as often as possible- and my kidlets have been enjoying our adventures as well. They all got new gear this spring as well- packs and boots at the least. Very rarely does a weekend pass that we don't hike at least once.
Even in the blowing rain on Sunday, we had a dozen hikers show up to brave the elements, not bad I say! And of course our Discovery Park hikes tend to bring around 30-40 hikers (don't worry, we all spread out and it's rare to find more than a handful of us together except in the beginning when I am giving my usual spiel).
So things are off to a good start this year at least! Bring on 2011!
