The Road Not Taken

On Tuesday (July 8th) The other volunteer and myself got a day off together and we decided to go hiking and check out the nearby Twin Falls. It was stunningly beautiful and warm day, however the trail ended up being way too short for our liking, and it wasn't long before we reached the viewpoint for the waterfall. We had two choices, either turn back and take the second, longer trail, or continue on and make our own trail. I was instantly reminded of the famous Robert Frost poem 'The Road Not Taken' and with that in mind we chose to forge our own path and get a closer look at the falls.

We started off by climbing up onto the rocks that ran alongside the viewpoint. It was a pretty steep cliff face, but we managed to find enough indents and grooves to place our hands and feet to successfully make it up. Once over the cliff, we followed a rock path right down to the river, where there was still ice and snow from the winter. We then crossed the river using an Ice bridge that was still standing and that took us pretty close to the waterfall. From there we made our way down some more rocks, right to the bottom of the waterfall, before it got too cold to go any further. By this point we were soaked to the bone from the spray and as all the water is glacial run off water, it was pretty darn cold!

It was a wet, cold and very rough walk/climb, but ultimately worth it. Taking the road less traveled really paid off for us and it had been a long time since I had that much adrenaline running through me. Both of us said, while walking back that we were shaking not just because of the cold, and that our legs felt like they had turned to jelly. Unsurprisingly the way down took a bit longer.

After our hike, we grabbed some very well deserved ice-cream and went shopping, then once it had cooled down a bit, we headed out to the other side of the valley to hike some more on Hudson Bay Mountain. Still feeling a bit tired from this morning, we opted for the easy trail, adorably named 'Fuzzy Monkey'. It's actually a mountain biking trail, but walking it was fun too. We found a lot of fur in the branches that we instantly recognised as bear fur. After working with bears for almost a year, it's very easy to tell simply from the smell.

I am still working on getting the pictures up for this post and the previous, soon, I promise!