Great C&O Canal Walk and Critter Sightings!

Had a wonderful walk along the C&O Canal Sunday with my girlfriend. Beautiful wintry day, and several delightful surprises!

(Note: click on an image to enlarge it.)

The first bit of excitement was a small hawk zooming across the towpath directly in front of us and perching in a tree overlooking the river. As regular readers have probably figured out by now, I'm a bit of a nut on raptors, so this was very cool. Based on the size and markings, from the quick glimpse of him flying, I guessed it to be a Sharp Shinned Hawk. Another walked speculated it might have been a Kestrel Falcon, but I didn't think so. Based on the photos I took of it perched, and looking at bird books and websites, I think we were both wrong. The hawk had a long tail, common to both Kestrels and Sharpies, but the rounded tip shown in this photo isn't typical of the Sharpie, and the lack of any russet tones rules out the Kestrel.

So what was it? At the moment, I'm leaning toward either a small/young Cooper's Hawk (which does have a rounded tail), or a Merlin, a slightly bigger relative of the Kestrel, without the russet coloration. The Cooper's is far more common, but this bird was rather small for a Cooper's. Anyone else want to chime in? This photo was taken with a 12x zoom, and then cropped heavily to feature the bird. The original and a couple of other shots are at:

C&O Canal, Jan 30, 2011

The next fun thing was the canal being frozen hard enough for my girlfriend to try out her "new" skates! These were bought for all of $7 at a local thrift store, and look virtually brand new. I don't have any skates, so I basically just slid around on my boots, and watched and cheered as she and her dog zoomed around the ice. Such fun!

We were out in the afternoon, from around 3:30 to 6:30, and the light was just amazing. And we saw a beautiful sunset too boot. On the return walk, we had three other wonderful surprises... First from far off we got to watch a red fox trotting about the ice in the area known as Widewater. He appeared and disappeared several times, seeming to hide among the small rocky islands in the basin there. Suddenly, he made a decision and set out across the ice, ultimately climbing the bank and vanishing into the woods on "our" side of the canal.

A little while after that, we startled a great blue heron, which took off with a mighty flapping of wings, circling around to finally sail off over the river ahead of us. It was nearly dark by then, so we were at least as surprised as the heron was. Really amazing to see it rise from the dark waters and fly into the darkening sky.

Finally, as we were nearing our starting point, and the sun had been down quite a while, we both stopped, transfixed... at first I thought I was hearing things... or mistaking something for a sound I haven't heard in a very long time. But no, we both stopped and listened, and there was no mistaking the sound of a large pack of coyotes, on the far (Virginia) bank of the Potomac, singing their eerie song! The last time I'd heard that sound was when I lived in Flagstaff, AZ, about a decade ago, and it was surprising, exciting, and a little chilling to hear it here. There's just something so wild and strange about their call... I remember being alone in a tent, far back in the Coconino National Forest, and hearing that sound. It's really like nothing else you've heard.

Check this link for some audio clips and info on coyotes:

http://www.junglewalk.com/popup.asp?type=a&AnimalAudioID=720

And:

http://www.kwic.com/~pagodavista/coyote.wav

for a direct link to a recording of coyotes.

All in all, a wonderful, beautiful walk, and a delightful day. Made all the better by a hot meal and a quiet evening talking about it afterwards.

More photos:

C&O Canal, Jan 30, 2011

Snowshoes!

Yep, I did it. I bought myself a pair of snowshoes. I'd heard over the years from various folk how much fun they were, but never felt any great drive to buy a set here in the mid-Atlantic, where heavy snows are pretty rare. Then back in December we had a big storm... dropped around 20" here, which is a lot for us. And the first day I walked in to work after the storm, I saw a pair of women zooming along on their snowshoes as I slogged through the snow in my regular boots. It looked really fun... but geez, "there's no way we'll get another snow like this this winter" I thought.

Well, um... we did! As you know if you live here, or if you've followed my blog. In fact in February we've gotten something around a total of 30" of snow, all in the space of a week. So as that series of storms was descending upon us, I decided to give it a shot and ordered a pair of snowshoes online. There were a few snags along the way... but yesterday around noon, there they were, thanks to UPS! So I decided to waste no time and headed out to try them out on... you guessed it, my beloved C&O Canal!

What a blast! It's an amazing sensation to be out in deep snow and to be able to walk ON it, instead of sinking deep and having to slog through it. It's all about surface area, I suppose, and these suckers have plenty of that. Sizing of snowshoes is based on weight, so for me a 30" x 9" snowshoe is the best choice. They look huge but once they're on, they're really not ungainly. Maybe it's because I read and heard many warnings, but I really didn't ever feel like I was having to work hard to avoid tripping on my own feet. I'd heard that was one of the adjustments you have to make, essentially adopting a wider than normal stance, but I didn't really have to think about it. Perhaps my mind and body compensated unconsciously, or perhaps I naturally walk a little bowlegged (I'm suddenly reminded of a recent Prairie Home Companion "Lives of the Cowboys" sketch... but I digress!). Either way, I found it easy and natural to walk in them.

And what a gorgeous day! A little chilly, but not windy, and while it was mostly overcast, it was still lovely to be out in the snow in solitude. I think the whole two plus hours I was out I saw exactly two people, both on skis. The towpath was covered in snow, as were some parts of the canal, and the woods to either side wore it like a soft white blanket. View of the river were as always spectacular, and the water itself was an amazing shade of green. There were a lot of ducks out and about, and a couple of kingfishers (skittish birds!), and a fair number of deer. I managed to get a few good pictures of the deer, and even some nice shots of the ducks. Even the trees were remarkable, with their branches and trunks standing out in dark contrast to the snow.



Take a look at the flickr album Feb 17, 2010 Snowshoeing on C&O Canal to see more shots, including a series of closeups I took of the severed end of a large, fallen tree branch. A surprisingly beautiful thing.

In the Immortal Words of Ron Popeil...

"But wait, there's MORE!"


More snow that is. We were sitting here with about two feet, give or take, already on the ground, and then yesterday another storm rolled in, bringing with it somewhere around another foot of snow and lots of wind. It may still be coming down a little in some parts of the DC region, but I think it's now mostly the wind we have to worry about.

Anyway, I went for a nice long walk in the woods and around Vienna today, while it was still coming down.





Apparently, the local NBC affiliate sent this reporter and her cameraman out to stand next to Maple Ave, in Vienna, and talk about the snow. We're weird in the DC area... weather is a major news story. I suspect any of you in the midwest are thinking "this is news????"







Anyway, one of the featured topics was apparently the Vienna Inn, a local institution, a tiny little bar/restaurant with great chili dogs that seemed to be the only open business in town. Note the number of cars in the lot... and I'm sure more folks walked! Busy day for them.




More photos can be seen here:

Feb 10, 2010

Some More Photos...

... of the big snowstorm of February 5th/6th. Click on the highlighted links below to see more.






I went out on Saturday for a nice long walk in the woods behind my place, and took a BUNCH of pictures while the snow was still falling. It was probably a good two feet at that point, and I think we topped out around 30" here, but I don't know that for sure. That's me after the walk. If it looks odd, it's because my right arm is sticking out, holding the camera.

01-06-2010 Snowstorm,midday











And here's a shot from Sunday, and my walk in to the shop. I'm lucky that a good part of my commute involves a walk through the woods. This is the small stream I cross every morning, looking very wintry and lovely.

Feb 7, 2010, day after storm

Last Canal Walk of 2009?

Probably. It's not likely I'll be on the C&O Canal again before the new year.

I won't use a lot of words here. Suffice to say it was a cold and breezy and wonderful walk. Many birds, different ones now... we're into the season of juncos and titmice. Also saw a beautiful red-tailed hawk and a pileated woodpecker. I'm always taken aback by just how big those pileated woodpeckers are.

Photos from today are at:

December 29, 2009, C&O Canal

Our Winter Wonderland Last Week

I didn't find the gumption to sit down and write about it, and it seems a little silly more than a week later to spend the time, but I did want to post one picture and a link to more, from the lovely snowfall we had on December 18th, here in the DC area. A rare event in this region, a heavy snowfall before Christmas, and in this case, apparently record-breaking, with reports of from 16" to 22" or more.

This picture is from the woods behind my place. More can be seen at:

December 18, 2009 ride home from work

December 19, 2009, walk to work

Dec 19, 2009 walk home

December 20, 2009 walk to work

December 21-23, 2009

Winter Riding

So we finally got our first "real" snow here in the DC area. And yes, for those of you in the midwest, or New England, or the Rockies, well, it's pretty lame. Even one of Obama's kids commented on that. But you'd be amazed just what turmoil ensues with the slightest trace of snow here. Motorists in particular just can't seem to cope with it. A few flakes appear and everyone panics!



The snow started on Tuesday, early in the morning, and really only added up to a couple of inches. The tricky part was it was followed, as it so often is in this region, by freezing rain. So by the time all was said and done, we had a hard crust on top of a thin layer of snow, and a pretty fair amount of ice on the roads, sidewalks, and paths around here.

Monday I brought my Miyata 210 commuter (shown above, in the woods on my ride today) to work, so I could mount my studded tires, since the forecast was calling for snow. I joked to John, my boss, that since I was planning on putting the tires on, we would end up not getting any snow at all. Well, at the end of the day, I hadn't gotten around to mounting the tires... and at about 4 am the next morning the snow started. To the DC area as a whole, I apologize, it's my fault.

Since I neglected to deal with it on Monday, and Tuesday was a day off, Wednesday found me walking to the shop to finally put the studs on the bike. I rode home on residential streets, which were pretty clear by then, so the tires really didn't make a big difference.

Thursday morning, however, was a different story! As you can see in the photos here, the multi-use trail I ride was covered in a hard, frozen, bumpy crust. And the dirt path I ride to get to the trail was just as bad. I was really glad to have the studs this morning, as the hard, frozen surface would have been difficult if not impossible to ride otherwise. It's pretty remarkable how well the studs keep your wheels stuck to the ice as you ride. If you look at the tire photo above, there are 106 of those metal tips in each tire. They don't look like much, but they make a huge difference. My ride is only a little over a mile, but I've done longer rides on the same tires, and have never really felt like the bike was going to just slip out under me. Sure, the traction can get a little weird, especially when the surface has been made irregular by footprints and tire tracks, but as long as you stay relaxed and just have a little faith, you can roll right along without mishap.

Two other features make this bike particularly suited to winter commuting. First, as you can see in the final photo, is the internally geared hub. This particular one is a Shimano Nexus 8 speed, which gives a really nice range of gears and works really smoothly and reliably. An advantage to all internal hub gears is that you can change gears when standing still or coasting, unlike a derailleur bike. Unlike some internal hub gears, the Nexus will also shift while you are pedaling, making it a really versatile gadget, and well suited for riding in traffic. Finally, all of the workings of the hub are protected from the elements by being inside the hub shell, while a derailleur system has all of its bits and pieces exposed.

The other items that I find really handy for winter riding are the pedals. You can see in the photo, they are big, wide BMX-style pedals with pins that grab the soles of your shoes. These are ideal for winter, because when there's snow on the ground, I tend to ride in light hiking boots, and with my size 13 feet, you really need a pedal with a large platform for your foot. And the pins are a godsend when it's slippery out, due to rain, snow, or ice.

The observant bike geeks will wonder why I have two chain rings on the bike when there's no front derailleur. Well, when I first set up the bike, I thought I'd like to have a smaller chain ring for lower gears in winter, bigger ring for higher gears the rest of the year. It's easy enough to slide the wheel in the frame to adjust the chain tension, but honestly, once I put the chain on the small ring last winter, I never bothered to move it back. So now the bigger ring is basically a chain guard. A chain guard with sharp, pointy teeth, so not that useful as a chain guard either.

Anyway, if you've never tried riding in winter, in snow and ice, you really should give it a try. Buy yourself a set of studded tires and have a go. Or if you're really adventurous and have patience and time on your hands, you can make your own studded tires. Information on this and more information than you ever imagined about winter riding in general can be found at: http://www.icebike.com/