Black Hills 4: Prairie Loop Trail

The next day I wanted to further indulge myself in the prairie landscape. Mountains are fun, but we have plenty of them in Colorado. We drove back to a trailhead that I had spotted the night before. We only made it a few hundred feet from the car before we disturbed a pronghorn- we got some great views as he charged across the meadow.

Parts of the hike were in forested terrain, but most of it was open prairie.

Primrose on the prairie

As we climbed up onto a ridge, we suddenly found our way blocked by a large herd of bison:


We patiently waited for the herd to mosey off before continuing the hike.

Sky and Shirley (and Bunny) stopping for lunch

"Prairie Grapes"

An idyllic little oasis of green

Black Hills 3: Wildlife Loop Road

Back at our campsite after the hike, we loaded up the cars with binoculars, cameras, guidebooks, and tripods, and set out to do a drive around Wildlife Loop Road. The weather was cloudy and stormy, but generally cleared up as we drove around. We traveled to a couple of viewpoints, and enjoyed some nice views of the peaks we had just climbed.

The fun part, however, started when we saw our first Bison.
As we traveled around the loop, we saw more Bison, Pronghorn Antelope, Deer, and several different birds. It's called Wildlife Loop for a reason!

Storm clearing over the plains

Wildflower on the red rock that rims the valley

Penstemon on the plains.

West Coast Trail Preview

Last weekend we returned from our vacation to British Columbia to hike the West Coast Trail in British Columbia. It was an eventful trip, and many more stories, photos, and videos will grace this blog as soon as I have time to post-- I've been spending too much time this summer having fun rather than writing about it. Er... maybe not. :-)

The Good
The West Coast trail was absolutely beautiful. We saw otters, seals, seal lions, whales, and bald eagles. Six nights camping on the beach was just lovely. Waterfalls, surf, sea caves, tide pools, and really cool temperate rain forest.

The Bad
On the sixth day of the backpack, Dorinna's knee started hurting. By the middle of the night it was noticeably swollen, and by morning she effectively couldn't walk. With a borrowed cell phone, we managed to get out a call to Search and Rescue. When the paramedics arrived on the beach, took off the band-aid, and watched green pus ooze out, they declared it a raging infection. We spent 8 hours in the Victoria hospital emergency room that night, and had a rough flight home the next day. Upon arrival in Fort Collins, we went immediately back to the ER for more intravenous antibiotics. She's getting much better, but it wasn't a great way to end the trip. Thankfully it was an easy rescue (the advantage of camping on a beach), and it was the last day of our trip.

The Difficult
The West Coast Trail is the hardest trail I have ever hiked. Heavy packs didn't help of course, but this was ridiculous. Roots, rocks, huge mud wallows, fallen logs, you name it. Ladders like you wouldn't believe... Here you go:




On that one day of the hike, we went up and down forty-one ladders. The other days had ladders too, along with swinging suspension bridges, ropes, rope ladders, hand-operated cable-cars and two ferry crossings. It was 47 miles of crazy-hard hiking.

More to come...

Black Hills 2: Cathedral Spires Road

After our hike, we drove back to the campground. However, we had a bit of a delay on the drive, as we had to wait at a tunnel for a bus. As you can see, passing room was a little bit limited:
A bus enters the tunnel from the opposite direction. The bus driver took extra care to line himself up properly. Once inside the tunnel, the buses traveled at about 2 mph.

While waiting for the buses, Dorinna posed by the Needle's Eye rock formation.
I had fun scrambling up the coarsely-grained granite for this shot down at the parking lot.
Another car enters the maw of the tunnel.

Black Hills 1: Little Devil's Tower

Memorial Day weekend is always a challenge. In Colorado, heavy snows prevent backpacking in the mountains. In Utah and southwest Colorado, it's already getting hot and crispy. This year we gathered up a group of friends and headed north to the Black Hills of South Dakota.

This was my first trip to the Black Hills, so I didn't know what to expect. What I found were a surprisingly rugged collection of mountains, spectacular prairies, and plentiful wildlife.

We left work early on Thursday, and spent over an hour trying to pack car camping gear into our two cars. The drive across Wyoming was very scenic, with great views of the prairie. On one stretch of road, we followed what appeared to be the busiest train track in America. On another we saw a family of deer, with a coyote checking them out from 100 yards away. And of course, enough hawks and antelope to fill a small football stadium. The best part, though, was an extended sunset that lasted for hours.

Only five hours later we rolled into Custer, South Dakota, where we had a hotel room for the night. Custer was a nice little town, with a great breakfast place. After fueling up with food and coffee, we drove into Custer State Park to our reserved campsites at Legion Lake. We set up our campsite, and then piled into one car to go hike the Little Devil's Tower.

Kevin in front of Little Devil's Tower

The trail was short but very steep. The rocks, terrain, and vegetation reminded me of the northeast, but without the pesky bugs.

Cathedral Spires

Kim in front of Harney Peak, tallest mountain in South Dakota

Cathedral Spires

Dorinna climbing on the summit of Little Devil's Tower

Dorinna's Naturalist Hike (post 2 of 2)

This field of Perky Sue caught my interest.

Dorinna's Naturalist Hike (post 1 of 2)

Dorinna recently completed her training to become a naturalist for Larimer county. A week after my parent's visit, she led her first hike. The topic was wildflower families, and she led our group to Horsetooth Falls, showing off the flowers along the way.

Dorinna the Naturalist (photo courtesy Kevin McNinch)

Mouse Ears

Mom and Dad visit Fort Collins

Last month Mom and Dad visited us from New Hampshire for a long weekend. It was a busy trip. Our first day started with a hiking and birding visit to the Fossil Creek Natural Area. We saw a lot of different kinds of birds, as well plenty of the monster carp that dwell in the lake. We took other hikes at the Environmental Learning Center and the Poudre River trail. Our most ambitious walk, though, was a loop to visit Horsetooth Falls at Horsetooth Mountain Park. The flowers were out in force, and Spring Creek still had enough water in it to make it a worthwhile destination.

Towards the end of the hike we met a set of mountain bikers who warned us about a rattlesnake up the trail. Dad and I climbed up to see the snake and take his picture.

Besides hiking, we visited the Governor’s Invitational Art Show down in Loveland, saw a show at Hodi’s Half Note, and of course visited various restaurants and shops in Fort Collins. We tried to take a tour at New Belgium Brewery, but were stymied by a lack of tickets. We settled for trying a variety of delicious brews in the free tasting center.

We capped the weekend by holding “Martini Night” at the house, drinking a variety of alcohol concoctions while watching James Bond on the new stereo system.

My only regret from the visit was once again failing to take any pictures of people (namely, my parents).

Austria Vacation Log: Day 16, Final Days

Our last day in Austria. We started the day by going to the Augustinian Church for Sunday Mass. The Mass itself wasn’t that interesting- even with my German experience I could understand essentially none of it, but the music made it worthwhile- orchestra, choir, and real organ.

Dorinna and I had different goals for the day. As this was our last day in Europe, we decided to do our own thing. Dorinna visited the Haus der Musik music museum, went on a quest for an open grocery story to buy Nutella, and had a restful few hours reading in a park. For my part, yesterday’s visit to the Kunsthistoriches Museum had merely whetted my appetite for art.

My tour started at St. Stephansdom, the largest church in Vienna. The sculptures and sepulchers were fascinating- well worth the few euros just to see where all the dead emperors were buried. But I cruised through it pretty quickly, so that I could take two U-bahns and a tram to the main event- the Liechtenstein Museum.

I had lunch in the museum café- square noodles with butter and ham, with a side salad of lettuce and chives. I dropped off my stuff and enjoyed an afternoon of Baroque art. Security was very intrusive, watching everyone like hawks. For the first time in my life I was asked to “step back from the painting.” But the museum was almost empty, so it balanced out. I especially liked a series of wall-sized paintings by Peter Paul Reubens about the Roman emperor Decius Mus. The library downstairs was just stunning- the kind of library you would have if you loved books and money was no object- books stretched from tiled floor to frescoed ceiling.

I went to the gift shop to buy the catalog, and bought a German kid’s book. It was a mystery book, loosely based on the Da Vinci code, where you have to solve the mystery. I explained to the attractive young woman behind the counter that I was learning German, but could only read children’s books. “Wenn Man kein Kind ist, es ist schwer interesante Kinderbücher zu finden.” (When one is not a child, it is hard to find interesting children’s books.) She was quite friendly, and told me to enjoy the book. I was quite proud of the fact that the entire exchange was in German.

Dorinna and I arrived at our rendezvous point at just about the same time. We met at the Café Demel, perhaps the most famous bakery in Wien. Two pieces of Sachertorte (a rich chocolate cake), and a Kleiner Brauner (a slow-extracted espresso with milk) later, we went back to Brezel –Gwölb for dinner. I had some pretty amazing cheese spaetzle and good beer. We took a long walk home, including a short u-bahn ride.

The next day our trip ended with an uneventful train and plane ride back to America. It was a great vacation, but we were pretty tired, and we decided that our next vacation would be back in the United States.

Two days later, I read a travel article about Croatia in Outside magazine…

This concludes the story of our Germany-Austria trip from 2005. I’ve still got a large backlog of interesting trips still to describe, including our Central European trip to Hungary and the Czech Republic from last summer, so stay tuned…

Limitations of a Subaru Outback

Note to self: Leave shovel in car until July. Backpacking cook pot and sticks are not practical digging devices.