Hiking Aska Trails along Deep Gap!

Yesterday the weather was pawsome!

So Mum got up early, got a ton of work done, then we headed out to find a new trail to hike.

Our original plan was to hike from Aska Road along the Aska Trails along Deep Gap to Blue Ridge Lake, which on the map looked like about two miles in and two miles back. We took a wrong turn on the way there (the maps we've found so far aren't very good). So we got to the trail head kind of late, about 5:00 PM.

If you've ever hiked in the Mountains, you know that they are dense forest for the most part, and even mid-day there isn't much sun; which is nice to keep things cool in the summer, but the sun goes down a lot faster.

Even though we got there late, we decided to get as close as we could get to the lake, see if we could make it. So we ventured out.

All along the trail I knew I saw squirrels, like everywhere! Made me a little manic throughout the entire hike. I made Mum stop sometimes, just so I could bark at 'em. Hold on Mum, gotta bark! Woofs!

When I get manic, Gracie gets a little manic too, here's her wild eyed look, BOL! Oh she was having a good time.

We got in about a mile, then we needed to take a turn. Guess what? The map was wrong and we of course took the wrong turn :). Headed down that trial a bit and it came to the end, so we had to turn back and find the right trial. The trails all over here aren't marked very well, if they are at all. So sometimes it's kind of a guessing game. That's why Mum wants to get a GPS unit.

K, Mum, where now?

We finally found the right trail, and tried to get a photo of the beautiful gap that the trail follows. They call it Deep Gap, and yep, it's deep alright, we couldn't see the bottom. Oh, I sooooo want to run down there...

We changed elevation a lot on this hike, up 300 feet, down 300 feet, up 300 feet, down 300 feet. Was a little hard on Mom going up, but she loved going down! We liked it too, 'cause then we got into trail running mode. Wheee!!!

We got up to one of the top elevations and Gracie had to take a little breather with Mum. Me? I was ready to move on!

We saw a lot, and I mean a lot of this...trail and more trail; woods and more woods.

We got in about two miles and didn't see any sunlight anymore. And we didn't know how close we were to the Lake, so Mum made the decision to head back and try another time when we could leave earlier in the day to make it all the way to the lake. We will try again, right Mum?

Where's the lake Gracie? Do you see it? Oh, right! Another squirrel!!!

On the way back, we had a very, very long hill to climb, it just went up and up and up. Mum was real glad when we finally reached a little level land, because she knew then that it as all downhill from there.

We finally made it back to the car at about 6:30. No rain, so we didn't need any extra clean up and Mum didn't have to worry about car floor liners. In total, we got in four miles. We've been keeping up our exercise in the yard, but Mum hadn't been doing much, so she was feeling the burn.

Two other really cool things: Mum has been giving me a new glucosamine/chondroitin supplement for the past few weeks and we think it's really making a difference. She can't remember me ever pulling the entire hike when we've done four miles; Gracie yes, but me never! Game Mum an upper body workout, we did :). We'll really be able to tell when we do our USDAA trial in a few weeks. Can't wait! And, no ticks! Didn't find a single tick on us through the day and night of the hike...we are loving no ticks crawling on us or Mum, loving it!

The weather was amazing since all the moisture in the air was pulled in by Irene. Hope all of you are safe and dry that were in the path, we sure have been thinking about you!

Happy week all!