I haven't talked about my hiking recently, because it sort of gets old after a while. Not for me, but for my reader. For me, it is a nice way to relax and get some exercise.

Saturday was a perfect day for a hike. Well, there is no real perfect day for a hike, because a day that is fine when resting is slightly too hot for hiking, and a day that is fine when hiking is a bit chilly when stopping to rest.

So Saturday was more the former than the latter. Just a bit warm once your feet had been moving for a while, but perfect for those moments when we wanted to stop, and just too damned gorgeous for any rational person used to our typical weather to be inside. The sun was out all day, with cotton candy clouds adorning the sky, but not blocking in any way the brightness.

We walked along a former rail bed for about 8 miles, and then did about 4 miles going up and down a gentle hill, stopping for lunch at a wooded area near the peak. There were just six of us. A bunch of middle aged white collar workers enjoying the exercise our day jobs usually don't give us. The oldest of us was in her early 60s, the youngest in his mid 30s.

Besides our small crew, we ran into just a smattering of other people. We were just south of a small village about 10 miles away from the nearest city of 30,000, and I don't think a lot of people are aware that this trail exists. The straight clear line of the former railroad portion of our hike was perfect for bicycling, and we saw maybe a dozen during our 4 hours there. There were also a few people walking their dogs, and a few more people fishing.

The area alongside the rail path was a wetlands, and at one point there was a large pond that was maybe a quarter mile across. We saw geese in the pond, ducks in some of the smaller water areas, a few blue heron (beautiful large birds with long legs) in the marshes. About halfway up the hill at the edge of the woods, we disturbed a flock of wild turkey. There were other assorted smaller birds chirping away in the distance unidentified. I can remember a scarlet tanager and a few red wing black birds in some of the open fields we passed by.

Of mammals, we saw one deer, a few beaver (and plenty of evidence of their work in the numerous dams across the wetlands), and a few chipmunks. Of the insects, I can only recall seeing a fair number of monarch butterflies.

We saw a lot of flowers of course. In the wetlands we saw day lilies, a non-native species which are bright orange, about four inches across and have deep throats; black eyed susans (prompting the inevitable joke about Larry's wife), somewhat smaller with black centers and yellowish orange petals arranged like very large daisies; and some wild cucumber. Along the roadside we saw chickory, a pale blue, very hardy flower about an inch across; white queen anne's lace (which looks exactly like what it sounds like); purple marsh mallow, which has small four somewhat indented petals and deeply lobed leaves, and some variety of white morning glory, a sort of bell shaped flower maybe an inch across. The red berries of honeysuckle bushes frequently lined the edge of our path along the wetlands, while in slightly drier areas we found ripe and sweet wild rasberries.

A couple of people talked about local trail maintenance, we learned a bit about local vocational services for the handicapped, some about someone's up coming trip to Italy and hikes they have planned there. The war in Iraq drifted into our conversation at some point (my fault), and we all talked about our kids. I, of course, had a bunch of field guides which I had to pull out at various points. We walked in for between 4 1/2 and 5 hours. Not a blistering pace, but enough to feel like we had done something good with our bodies.

Afterwards, we all had ice cream.