Of all the hikes we had been doing, this last part was the most challenging, and after a while, we did not meet a single soul anymore, and did not wonder why - the path was very narrow, rather slippery, sometimes steep, and at times one really had to consider every single step. It slowed us down quite a bit from our usual pace, and even though I still took pictures, I really had to be careful and focused all the time and so fell back quite a bit behind O.K. The bits of the path you see in the pictures are the best bits - I did not dare to stop for pictures on the difficult stretches.
The woods grew more and more silent around us, the water became a mere trickle until it stopped altogether. You could only hear our steps crunching on the leaves and pebbles, or squelching in the mud.
The last 2 1/2 km felt "harder" than the entire hike of the day before! But it was great, and I enjoyed every moment of it.
When we finally reached the end of the gorge and came upwards "into the light", it was almost as if we'd won something!
We walked along the sunny country lane with hardly any cars coming along until we reached the parking lot again.
And the day was not yet over, as you will see in one of my next posts.
How GREEN September seems compared with now! Some of the most scary paths I ever hiked were along the edge of a steep crater in S. France. Actually they can't have been that scary, since we were staying right next to the start of the walk and quite a few people did it. So perhaps it was just me! But I still remember the wonderful feeling. I also really enjoyed hiking on the Greek island of Kythera
ReplyDeleteThere were plenty of brown leaves from last year on the ground, and some yellow leaves on the trees already, but it was still largely green. I guess it will look rather different now, 4 weeks later!
DeleteHiking along the edge of a crater sounds a little scary, especially if there is no handrail.
I can see my knees would not like that walk... ;)
ReplyDeleteIt was rather steep in parts, and the slippery mud wasn't helpful ;-)
DeleteSounds wonderful to me, to only hear the sounds of the forest and footsteps. Very happy you got to enjoy this, Meike.
ReplyDeleteThank you, Kay, so are we!
DeleteYou do like to challenge yourselves....As Kay said, this sounds wonderful, solitude and challenge and success!
ReplyDeleteMost of the time, I just enjoy being out there, breathing fresh air and seeing beautiful countryside. But a challenge (on a small scale) every now and then is good, too.
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