Fantastic Day for a Birthday Hike

Well after a looong couple of nights with poor sick Jack having high fevers and strange dreams and screaming out things like "Recon Mission Aborted", I was happy to wake up today to have him at normal temps and feeling pretty spiffy. After I made sure they could all survive without me, Ki and I headed out for a hike in the gorge.

We started at Multnomah Falls.

and after some steep switchbacks

we made it to this pretty spot that hooks up to the Larch Mtn Trail.

We happened upon a memorial and I immediately got goosebumps thinking that this beautiful spot by the water with the amazing Winter sun shining down through the trees might have been his favorite part of this hike. I wondered about his story for a good little while.

We got to the half way point and had some good views.

The wind was really whipping around up there. Some trees creaked and groaned and tried to shake me up a bit with their ghostly noises, but we mostly just heard the wind rustling everything about in their tops. It was so incredibly lovely and fresh up there on this most beautiful day! It was perfectly crisp and sunny and I couldn't stop taking in deep breaths and smiling from ear to ear.

We ended at Wahkeena Falls for a total of about 2 hours hiking time

and headed back home. Just got cleaned up and we're heading out to Birthday dinner.