chapter 258
1/23/2011
Snowshoeing
black & white photog
link to Ushers Road State Forest folder (28pics)
Silly, but I must share these pictures. It was the best snowshoe hike I've ever had and I was able to capture many nice doggie pictures. It is very difficult to get a good exposure of an all black dog but the natural soft diffuse light reflecting off the snow gave the effect of reflectors that are used by professional photographers all the time. This is already covered in the social network for Misha Dawgone but some of you are not among her 204 facebook friends.
We had a couple 6 inch snowstorms recently yielding a nice fluffy snow depth. In fact the parking lot was so deep we couldn't park with our 4WD truck and had to find a spot down the street. The mile hike around the nearby Ushers Road State Forest was exhausting, but would have been ten times worse without the flotation snowshoes give. It was sunny but cold around 22 degrees but had jacket open with the work effort. Granddog Misha just loved every moment of the adventure and found good footing most of the time in the remnants of the trail.
As a teen I had to check the trap line for muskrats each morning or evening during the winter with our black and white German shorthaired pointer dog. Discarded my poor quality pictures of him on the trap line but I did include one of the stream/ snow conditions (believe it or not). When snow conditions required snowshoes, it was a feeling of power to be able to traverse in any condition, but it was pure misery clunking those heavy wide (for a kid) wooden snowshoes smashing the ankles and the exhausting traverse a half mile up the valley. The modern narrow aluminum shoes I use on occasion now feel so much better. Probably wouldn't have bought myself, but Kathy surprised me with them as a gift. I still have a pair of the original wooden bearpaws although we usually used the beaver tail design for better flotation.
There is more and more interest in snowshoeing with magazine coverage and local races where Misha and I train. It's nice to go fast, but it can be nicer to go slow and savor the moment. Misha and I will always have Ushers Forest.