A hiking we will go...

Peter and I have been taking advantage of the beautiful scenery as often as possible and have set a goal to go on at least two hikes per month during the spring and summer. We have discovered some truly lovely places and look forward to visitors as now we have even more places to show off. Tory, Jenny, Dottie, Shelle....I'm lookin' at you ladies!!!

One of our favorite trails is a section of the Perimeter Trail that starts at Morgan's Steep and ends at the Memorial Cross.

Morgan's Steep is also a prime spot to watch the sunset, BTW. We have done this hike twice now and the following photos are from both of these walks. The trail starts by following a fairly steep stone staircase to a short path to a creek and waterfall.


The trail continues on, around the creek and under the edge of the Cumberland Plateau. It's very rocky and offers several places to leave the trail and climb up for pretty views or meander down to the creek.



This trail even offers a tiny bit of real rock climbing to get thru a carved out tunnel called Proctor's Hall.

Both times we have done this trail there has been a good bit of ice. Today there were long sections where we really had to watch our steps because the trail was still iced over.

We look forward to seeing this trail in the spring. We saw several plants today that were starting to bud already.

Another trail we recently tried starts at the Memorial Cross and continues on the Perimeter Trail. It has some of THE MOST AMAZING views. It starts at the Cross, which on an ugly day is still just breath-taking.

It continues on and has ample places to pause to enjoy the view or even spread out a nice picnic.

We left the trail quite a bit to explore. One of the coolest features on this trail is a big boulder with Liesegang banding. Liesegang banding is a gemetric design that occurs naturally when iron deposits from water seep through sandstone. It looks almost like tire tracks in the rock. Very cool.

There is a creek that cuts across this trail too.

I'm a sucker for water in pretty much any form, so we spent a lot of time around it. On this particular day I was feeling especially goofy....

We look forward to hiking many more of the trails around campus, however we like these two so much that it's hard for us to try new ones! Peter has not explored the caves yet at Thumping Dick Hollow and we have heard good things about a place called Solomon's Temple, so maybe those two will be our March hikes. Come visit and we'll be glad to take you along with us!

It may be the shortest month, but....

February was such a busy month for us! We co-hosted a Super Bowl Party, I saw Mama Mia in Atlanta with mom and Jenny, and mom FINALLY was able to visit the Mountain! The Super Bowl party was an absolute blast! Not only did our New Orleans Saints win (WOOT!), but I got to dig out my Mardi Gras decor: and we were surrounded by tons of great friends. The party was so big that we used both sides of our duplex (The Game was on at Bob and Sydney's and Glee Season one was on at our house), and had folks around the fire pit in the yard.

The following weekend I headed to Atlanta to see a show with mom and Jenny. It started to snow on my way there and the normal 3 hour drive to Jen's took me SIX HOURS!!!! When I got to Jenny's there was about 4 inches of snow on the ground. Mama Mia was so cute! I never saw the whole movie, but I do love musicals and Abba, and seeing a show in the Fabulous Fox Theater was awesome!

After my visit to Jenny's mom followed me, thru the snow, back to the mountain for her first visit to Sewanee. The weather prohibited us from doing any hiking, but she did get to see campus at it's prettiest!

On mom's last day in town we went downtown for shopping and coffee at the Blue Chair. Our view from the coffee shop:
We walked back home and saw some of the most beautiful, snow-covered sites I have ever seen!

As beautiful as campus is under a thick blanket of snow, I am thrilled that the snowy season is coming to an end!!! Yesterday our high temp neared 55 degrees and the sun was shining! It felt like heaven. We are looking forward to our first spring on the mountain and spending more time outside. Peter and I will be heading to P'cola soon to visit our friends and be part of the McGuire's 5K, a race we have been participating in for the past 7 years.