HIKING CLUB

30 minutes ago I was outside dinking around with the rain barrels, hoping I have the downspout thingee inserted correctly to catch all this free rain – if I don’t, I will just have to fool around with it until I get it ‘right’: and write it down this time so I will remember next time I go through this setup ;-)

While I was outside, my back fence neighbors, Ed and Trudy came out to chat with me (I did ask Ed about the downspout insert, and he was clueless too); anyway, we were talking … and the end result is that I am now a member of the Mt. St. Helen’s Hiking Club :-D

It sounds like a lot of fun – and I love hiking.

This is a true answer to prayer.

I go to bed every night asking Elohim to help me get back to enjoying some of the things I loved to do in my previous life, with Bob; and to please put a companion across my path that I can do these things with … two companions moved into the house behind me, and asked me today to become part of a larger group of companions.

Doing these hiking adventures will also help me learn travel routes to various places outside my comfort zone – I will still need to find a ride with someone when the adventures moves into Portland, OR (as some hikes will); but generally, most of the hikes will be refresher routes for places Bob and I drove to, sans the backroad connects (those I will need to figure out on my own).

I am blessed and highly favored. Elohim is good!

While reading over the hiking club papers, I saw that many of the hikes are between 3 and 4 miles round trip; but I also noticed several of the hikes are 6, 8, 10 and 12 miles round trip – I need to get up to snuff for those! They go through beautiful terrain with waterfalls, so I definitely want to do them.

I knew we had bought a walk-a-meter counter a few years back, so I tore the house apart looking for it … and finally found it in the car’s console cubby: it is in my knapsack now, and I am going to use it every time I go hiking the local Parks, dikes, river trails, and Willow Grove hiking trail; so I can build up to those 6, 8, 10 and 12 mile hikes :-D

It’s not just a stamina issue – it’s a tolerance building up of my lungs, joints, and leg muscles that have not been used that hard in decades. Bob did not particularly like hiking, but he’d go with me … on short hikes. I have not been on a lengthy hike in decades: not since living in Cathlamet; we moved from there in 1993. While we lived in Cathlamet, there were days I’d go on a walkabout after Stacey left for school – I’d walk from where we lived on the flats down by the marina … out the Elochoman Road-up over Beaver Creek road-over to Oak Point; or over to Mill Creek junction … and back home again. That was a pretty looong walkabout. Sometimes, when my gypsy feet would start itching on a weekend and Bob had worked a long week, he’d watch the kids for a few hours while I walked around the Julia Butler Hansen Game Refuge, walking ALL the roads along the Columbia River and Steamboat Slough; and back home again. I enjoy getting out of the house and into the countryside.

Now this opportunity has come into my life.

I am jazzed.

I can’t wait to get back outside and start hiking again.

At the moment, it is raining:

Gray clouds heavy with rain rolling in ...

Wet & windy day near the river.

I hope and pray I got the downspout thingee installed correctly, to catch the rainwater ;-)