Sunday afternoon hike.

Last Sunday, we drove five minutes to the trailhead behind our house. It was gorgeous outside. Fifty-plus degrees and sunny. Felt like spring. From the trailhead, most go right up Saddle Rock. We opted to go left, to the old, defunct Dry Gulch dam. Since it's an old mining road, Sefton can walk the whole thing.

After a quick stop for a lollipop at the dam where we had all been before, we headed to the hill above, where we hadn't. Eventually, the trail topped out along a ridgeline opposite Saddle Rock.

Sefton was still going strong. So was K, twenty-four weeks pregnant and, for a short bit, carrying both kids.

She's our hero.

The views east across the Columbia and south back toward Mission Ridge were awesome. This vantage point was unique. Maybe because we had never been up there before, maybe because we were walking along a ridgeline. 

We had cranked up a thousand feet of elevation. 'We,' as in our toddler.

K, twenty-four weeks pregnant, too.

That lone tree left of center is a great spot I go running, also along a fabulous ridge. Saddle Rock from the south and west takes on a pretty epic profile.

The light was a dichotomy. Cool, like winter and also warm, like spring.

From the ridge then it was down, down, down. The trail was a sheet of ice. Thankfully, I forgot to take our microspikes out of the pack I was toting. Still, Sefton's legs carried him deftly down the slick trail, holding onto our hands.

Looking back in that photo, the trail is the ribbon of white that angles down the center of the frame. The ridgeline we had walked is along the top of the hill left of center. Thinking ahead a few weeks to when the snow and ice will be melted and the mud mostly dried… I can’t wait to run this route, from our doorstep.

Just another reason we live here…