After visiting Blue Ridge Wildlife Center, I headed for the mountains to see if I could find another frozen waterfall. Every pond, river and creek was iced over or running with a thick layer of ice on top. It was another freezing cold day, the wind blowing hard, but inside Stanley, the day looked glorious, with the sun shining brightly and I drove on a steep unpaved road up to the clouds.
Even being in the middle of nowhere high up on Mount Weather, I was not surprised to see 2 cars parked near the trail. These days it gets harder and harder to really escape from society, but on these rarely used trails, I'm actually reassured to know someone else is near. Just in case.
After an uphill climb that ascended straight from the road, I crested the ridge, hanging on to my hat, and holding my scarf over my nose. It was so cold that it hurt my nostrils to breathe without protection. But a few minutes later the gales subsided as I went down and down on a narrow path, switching back and forth as I descended the hill while the winds roared above me, whipping the tree branches back and forth. It sounded a little scary but it was wonderful to be out here, walking briskly past mossy covered boulders, looking as though they were laid with emerald velvet table cloths. Bright green shards of wild onions poked up through the brown leaves that were dusted with a powdery white snow and the air was crisp and cold and deliciously earthy as I sucked it in.
I arrived down at the bottom and had to jump across a creek that was gushing with melted ice water. Across on the other bank was a huge rock, shrouded in shadows, and looking just like a huge toad walking down to the water. I leapt across the water and started climbing up to the waterfalls.
I actually preferred these falls to White Oak Canyon from last week. It was interesting that the middle falls were running yet on each side they were still frozen. I had this spectacular beauty all to myself so sat on a rock and watched for a while, as the sun dazzled through the trees on its way down to the horizon. The icicles sparkled and glittered, the rock faces shone with their thick ice coating of undulating smoothness. But I'd only sat for less than 10 minutes before I felt the frigid temperature drilling its way through my layers, and I had to stand again. Long shadows were being cast across the white ice, alternating between pale blue and pink. It was time to start back, I didn't want to be caught out here on my own and in the dark.
As I clambered back over some logs I looked up at the tall rock face in front of me, spotting a nest, high up, jutting out on an outcrop, possibly belonging to a red-tailed hawk, and wondered if it was for this year or left from last year. The rocks were slippery as I clambered back down, slipping more than a couple of times. I stopped to take a photo of these ice crystals that I kept passing or crunching on the path, marveling at their creation. They glittered and shone, looking like the glass from a broken windshield. I wished I had more time to examine them more thoroughly, there seemed to be an intricate pattern that nature had weaved across the dirt.
A panorama photo before I left. and then it was the climb back up to the summit, that wind had thankfully died down a little. It didn't take long to get back to the car, and I was grateful to sit inside with the heating on full blast, rubbing my hands and nose, before I set off for home.
Just a couple of minutes from my house and I came across this car crash. I sat patiently, glad it wasn't me in the mangled mess ahead, and sympathized with the poor persons involved, dealing with an accident situation in this freezing cold just before sunset. An emergency worker came up to me, advising me to turn back. Apparently the female driver had hit a utility pole, bringing down the line, but she was alive. I went back and around, along unpaved roads, and came across the gooses I'd seen a few weeks earlier, taking their routine waddle across to the field from their house. I sat and waited patiently for them too, counting my blessings, and very glad that I hadn't been in a rush to get home.
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