New Year's Morning 2013

Thousands of tired, nerve-shaken, over-civilized people are beginning to find out that going to the mountains is going home; that wildness is a necessity; and that mountain parks and reservations are useful not only as fountains of timber and irrigating rivers, but as fountains of life. Awakening from the stupefying effects of the vice of over-industry and the deadly apathy of luxury, they are trying as best they can to mix and enrich their own little ongoings with those of Nature, and to get rid of rust and disease. Briskly venturing and roaming, some are washing off sins and cobweb cares of the devil's spinning in all-day storms on mountains; sauntering in rosiny pinewods or in gentian meadows, brushing through chaparral, bending down and parting sweet, flowery sprays, tracing rivers to their sources, getting in touch with the nerves of Mother Earth; jumping from rock to rock, feeling the life of them, learning the songs of them, panting in whole-souled exercise, and rejoicing in deep, long-drawn breaths of pure wildness. ~ John Muir

Pictures from new year's morning summit.

The Slide on Cedar Run Trail

Icicles on Cedar Run Trail.

Ascending a snow packed Cedar Run Trail

Ascending an unbroken, posthole-ridden, icicle-piece covered Hawksbill Summit Trail. The isolated area of Hawksbill summit, though unbeknownst to most its visitors, is actually home to a small population of Balsam Fir, shown above on right.

Old Rag 3,291' as seen from Hawksbill summit 4,051', with ice frosted trees at front.

View west from Hawksbill 4,051', with Naked Top at front, Massanutten Mtn in the distance, and George Washington National Forest and West Virginia's mountains on the distant horizon.

View over Timber Hollow from Hawksbill 4,051'

Stony Man 4,011' just right of center, as seen from Hawksbill 4,051'

Vast view west from Hawksbill 4,051'

Upper Cedar Run.

Halfmile Cliffs as seen from Cedar Run Trail at The Slide

Wondering about possible scrambles up Halfmile Cliff

Lower Cedar Run.

View of Old Rag 3,291' as seen through the trees from Cedar Run Trail.

Lower Cedar Run

Lower Cedar Run Falls from Cedar Run Trail

Both of these get pretty wild, especially their later halves, but both are so good. These two seem to really nail home what it is that gets me moving with a smile. Gotta listen to both in their entirety, obnoxiously loud of course.

Dec. 10 - 16

I was not born to be forced. I will breathe after my own fashion. Let us see who is the strongest. What force has a multitude? They only can force me who obey a higher law than I. They force me to become like themselves. I do not hear of men being forced to live this way or that by masses of men.  What sort of life were that to live? When I meet a government which says to me, `Your money or your life,' why should I be in haste to give it my money? It may be in a great strait, and not know what to do: I cannot help that. It must help itself: do as I do. It is not worth the while to snivel about it. I am not responsible for the successful working of the machinery of society. I am not the son of the  engineer. I perceive that, when an acorn and a chestnut fall side by side, the one does not remain inert to make way for the other, but both obey their own laws, and spring and grow and flourish as best they can, till one, perchance, overshadows and destroys the other. If a plant cannot live  according to its nature, it dies; and so a man. ~ Henry David Thoreau

Week Summary: Dec 3 - 12

We are now in the mountains and they are in us, kindling enthusiasm , making every nerve quiver, filling every pore and cell of us. Our flesh and bone tabernacle seems transparent as glass to the beauty about us, as if truly an inseparable part of it, thrilling with the air and trees, streams and rocks, in the waves of the sun -- a part of all nature, neither old nor young, sick nor well, but immortal. Just now I can hardly conceive of any bodily condition dependent on food or breath any more than the ground or the sky. How glorious a conversion, so complete and wholesome it is, scarce memory enough of old bondage days left as a standpoint to view it from! In this newness of life we seem to have been so always. Through a meadow opening in the pine woods I see snowy peaks about the headwaters of the Merced above Yosemite. How near they seem and how clear their outlines on the blue air, rather in the blue air; for they seem to be saturated with it. How consuming strong the invitation they extend! Shall I be allowed to go to them? Night and day I'll pray that I may, but it seems too good to be true. Someone worthy will go, able for the Godful work, yet as far as I can I must drift about these lovemonument mountains, glad to be a servant of servants in so holy a wilderness. ~ John Muir (My First Summer in the Sierra)