Three Springs – These three springs are all within thirty feet of each other. It’s fascinating to me to be able to watch water appear out of the ground. This is what I’m looking for, secure water sources in this part of the wilderness. +2

Looking down ‘Spring Hollow.’

‘Spring Hollow’ – I spent some time exploring the hollow.

Heating Water for breakfast. +2

Spot my camp – I hadn’t realized that I had camped in sight of the forest road. +1

Old forest road – notice how wet and green it is. No wonder I found several springs near here.

Rainy day – and it had been a rainy night, the night before.

A break in the clouds.

Sunshine on a rainy morning – This is another deliberate stereo pair. The break in the rain was brief but long enough for me to get some pictures and do some exploring. +1

Camped above ‘Spring Hollow’ – The discovery of several springs near here decided me on my name for this hollow. It needs a name, as I’ll be back. +1

An evening visitor and more clumsiness – I was sitting in my hammock thinking about preparing dinner when I felt some water splash on my foot. It was raining hard, but I was nice and dry, and I thought it a bit odd. I bent down to investigate and spotted this little peeper, who’d hopped in to join me sheltering from the rain.

Photograph of Gary Allman in front of the Pole (Pete) Hollow Trail cairn, Hercules Glades Wilderness, Missouri. February 2021.

Pole Hollow Cairn (it’s behind me) – The weather seems to be doing a better job of keeping me off the trails in 2021 than COVID-19 did in 2020. Two-minute read

Journal: Searching for springs at Hercules Glades Wilderness, February 2021. Journal: 5 30

Packed and Ready to go – The Bishop’s staff were delivering the second of two training events for new vestry and church leaders this Saturday morning. Like most meetings nowadays, it was on Zoom. I got to be slide master, and we all gave 10-minute talks to introduce ourselves and let the folks know how we can help them. As soon as we’d finished delivering the morning’s training I was ready to get changed and head out of here! Two-minute read.

New work profile picture – It’s time for a new profile picture for work — the old one was taken in 2011, ten years ago. How did that happen?

Snow February 2021 – The snow was really fine and fluffy. Very easy to work with. Though I must confess, Ginger cleared the pathway down the drive. +1

Snowy Feat – I just couldn’t resist giving it a try. Despite it being around 13°F (-10°C) it wasn’t too cold. I ended up spending around 20 minutes outside clearing the snow off the front deck and path.

Snowy backyard with chairs gathered around the fire pit – It got cold. -13°F (-25°C) cold. Yes, we had a couple of short power cuts, but they were a minor inconvenience. Fortunately a week or so before the cold snap we had our furnace replaced with a new high-efficiency model. +1

Cold – Ho hum – It is 0°F (-17°C) outside, and we’ve just been told that there are going to be ‘rolling’ blackouts of 30-60minutes. Yay.

Snow day gear repairs – I’m usually pretty easy on my equipment, but recently I’ve got careless and damaged three items of my backpacking gear. Today I removed my temporary duct tape fixes and applied permanent repairs to my underquilt protector and rain skirt. One-minute read, +5

Any day that starts with bacon has to be good… I start every day with bacon.

Today is a triple espresso + Mountain Dew type of day…

Hike over, back at the trailhead – That’s my hike over, and it’s just before 4:15 p.m. Not bad, and still daylight. I should be home by 5:45 p.m. I completed today’s hike of six-plus miles in a little over three hours. I’ll take that.

Back at the Pole Hollow Cairn – It was too dark on the hike out Friday night for my obligatory Pole Hollow Cairn selfie, so I decided to slip one in on my return hike. +1

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