Wednesday’s hike was a wonderful 6-mile lumber with an average speed of 4 miles per hour; it was a great way to surpass the 800-mile mark in my ongoing journey by foot to find lost fitness and mental clarity.
What was not as wonderful was coming home, trimming weeds, and cutting the grass, which according to old files from my Garmin watch, is another 2 miles of walking at Toro-pace. Then quickly making lunch, showering, and getting to my Wednesday mind-bending session with the O.G.
I was wrecked, in a good way.
I took no photos at all on Wednesday, but I was back in the woods on Thursday for another—much slower—5.50-mile hike with my camera and found a ton of cooperative wildflowers (and flowering weeds) in the woods to distract me from the raging plantar fasciitis in my foot. Shit.
It was nice to get some pics of the woods in bloom, but the best part of the hike came about 3-miles in. As I made my way along River Trail, which, surprise, hugs the Chippewa River for long stretches, I heard a rustling in the trees down over the river bank to my right.
I continue to find the most random shit.
It startled me, of course, but I assumed it was just some ducks as usual. However, it was, in fact, a large American Bald Eagle, and it was less than 20 feet from me as it took flight! I was close enough to hear its large wings propelling it upward and see the gold of its eyes.
All I could do was stand and watch it fly off without being able to get even one shot off to capture the moment. Despite the lack of a photo, it’s something I won’t soon forget. What amazing birds!
After being forced to take Monday and Tuesday off from hiking and the pain in my heel flaring up, I don’t know if I’ll hit my self-imposed 25 miles this week. And if I don’t, that’s fine; I have a clean colon, surpassed 800 miles hiked since September 19th, got some random pics of flowers, and found myself the closest I’ve ever been to a bald eagle in the wild.
Here are the photos from the day, click to make bigger, scroll through, etc., etc.,
Later.
SOILED SOUNDS TRACK OF THE POST
This is an update to pay respects to former Smiths bassist Andy Rourke who passed away from pancreatic cancer today, aged 59. I’ve had a few musicians and entertainers die that I dug, but I think this might be the first person featured on several posters on my bedroom walls as a teenager. And as most of my friends know, for better or worse, The Smiths were the soundtrack to more than half my life. Fuck.
Barbarism Begins at Home
Live at the Oxford Apollo in 1985
from the radio bootleg Same Day Again by The Smiths
This track is taken from the same bootleg that I waxed nostalgic about in this post from 2020.
If you want, jump to about 5:28, from then on it is a masterful display of Andy’s bass mixed with Johnny Marr’s guitar.
< That night I put on one of my last remaining Smiths shirts (the one with the patched hole in the armpit) to “mourn” the loss. Also, note to self; moisturize and maybe update my iPhone 6 photo skills.