Ice Hiking in Grotto Canyon

Yes, I'm still working on the Arizona pictures.

In the meantime, we're still trying to extend hiking season. It was warm while we were in Arizona, but turned to winter as soon as we got back. A chinook blew in this weekend, and was initially forecasted to get us up to 20°, but the best we could muster on Saturday was about 12° and the odd bit of rain.



Undaunted, we decided to stay low and head up Grotto Canyon.



I like the canyon because of the cool rock formations, evidence that a whole lot of water used to come down this canyon.



Plus the Indian pictographs are pretty cool.



But wandering the canyon Saturday was all about the ice formations from the seeping walls.





Hiking the canyon was mostly snow and ice free. But there was one section about 20' long of smooth, glare, slippery ice that was a bit of a challenge. Be forewarned.

The Crab's Done

In this post, I talked a bit about the crab tree in the back yard. Well, the combination of snow and the windstorm we had a few weeks ago were its final undoing. It fell into the fern garden, and bashed the house on the way down.





Doesn't look like it badly damaged the stucco, but I will have to wait till the spring to get out a ladder and find out.

The birds already miss him.

Is Hiking Season Over?

We just got back from 10 days in Arizona (pictures to come) and this is what we woke up to this morning.



And though you can't really tell from the photo, it is indeed snowing.

On the bright side, ski season should start soon...