Joaquin Miller Park hiking

Happy new year !!!

First job after waking up in the morning in the winter is to check the outside temperature. Every morning in this winter I see the snow clad rooftop of every house. Every morning I check whether three is frost or not. The pervious night Mr.Man told about going hiking next day late morning. When I saw the temperature at 8 o’clock  in morning which showed 32 degree Fahrenheit.

At 8 o'clock in the morning

 I was in a ridiculous muddle, whether we should go hiking or not. I was just thinking to snuggle under the cozy thick blanket for another hour, before taking decision, when to move myself out of the bed.However, Mr. Man was adamant to go. So, I had to say to my cozy warm bed and started the day. Around 9:30 in the morning we started from home for Oakland. The car was on the driveway. 

The team is walking

It drenched itself the whole night in frost. The car was ice-cold when start. At 9:30 Mr. Sun was still taking his latest forty winks. Putting the heater in the car on high, still I was trembling.The sky was overloaded with dark cloud. The weather was moist and foggy. Moreover, rain god decided to pour some big rain drops on us. After reaching the foot of the trail we waited in the car for the arrival of our co-hikers. When they reached the big drops eventually turned into light shower and gradually stopped.

The lush greenery

 

We came out from the car with wobbly legs, trying to curl ourselves inside  our jackets. At last, we  shed  our all inertia and started walking on the trail.To our great relief we could start our hike without hassles. The sky was little foggy, temperature didn’t want to help us, and wind was also asking us to back.  The moist weather was tempting us to back home and sip a cup of hot coffee. Anyway, we defied everything, and went on.

Some beautiful wild fruits.. I don't know the name

 Our plan was to go on a light hike. We started around 10:30. The rain drenched trail was clad with mud and pebbles. The tall redwood trees stood tall along the trail, making a line like the children at school. The big ferns on bottom of the redwood trees showed that the area remained moist most the time. The big curly fern fronds clumped on the ground made numerous pods covering the ground.The trail was little bit steep in the beginning, as if like a road on a sand dune. 

Then the trail became narrow, and started going upwards winding the outer side of the mountain. Every now and then we found that tree fell on the train. Some times we had to jump over the fallen tree, some times we had duck our head to under the tree. There was no improvement in the weather.

One of the fallen tree

 We still felt cold. Some time the forest was so dense that it looked like sun was going to rest for the day. It was a round trip. As long as we clamped up , at least I felt no problem. Them came the downward trail full go mud, big uneven scary looking stones, and puddle. It was difficult to find place to put foot on the ground. The mud was so loose, the foot could get stuck there. On the top of that the boulders facing downwards, difficult to step on, in fear of slip. It took a lot of time to sowing down. I was the last person in the team to come. My feet froze out of cold made difficult to keep balance.

The dangling roots of a colossal redwood tree

 On the other hand , my son was jumping from one stone to another without tripping for a single time. First we started on Sunset trail, then took the Sequoia trail, and came to splash meadow. When we reached the meadow, it starred raining heavily. Luckily in the middle of the meadow there was big umbrella shaped tree. We ran under the tree, which provided us the natural umbrella. After waiting three, we understood rain god was not going to favor us. So, we decided to walk in the rain to reach the parking lot.   

The meadow at the end of the trail. After several attempt I could capture one bicyclist.