u.s.a. snowshoeing in Pennsylvania

our good friend monica (who has featured on this blog before, in alaska, and in our lives way before we even knew what the internet was) was living nearby and invited us over for a day. she now lives in pennsylvania. so she called us up and said, 'i'll just pop over and pick you up and take you for a hike,' as though it was down by the corner store even though it was several hours drive there and several hours back.

anyway, monica does what she usually does which is round up a group of amazing people, usually polymaths with outstanding musical skills and voices (not sure why she keeps on hanging out with us). then we saw an upcoming 'winter weather advisory' and did what any sane person would do in the face of dangerous condition warnings....we went snowshoeing!

of course, we had never done any such thing before and it was so exciting we could barely wait. we parked by the side of the highway, and after 15 minutes of ignorance where monica made sure our snowshoes weren't on backwards, we started off. 

snow has an amazing capacity to absorb sound, and thus it was that about 5 minutes away from the highway we could hear nothing and it felt like we were completely in the middle of the wilderness. then we came to this beautiful wooden bridge...

snowshoeing is way older than i would have thought. in 1991 a man was found frozen in the swiss alps. scientists think he died around 3,000BCE. he had what some scientists think might be snow shoes strapped to his back. happily our trip had a happier ending than his.

to make it even more awesome, the place we were snowshoeing was amazingly beautiful and quiet. what is it about winter that makes everything so beautiful. we wove between frozen streams, over picturesque wooden bridges, and past softly snow-covered open spaces.

we named this brother 'american kennie'. he was always off on one side of the trail walking on frozen ponds, jumping up and down to see if he could crack the ice, trying to find more challenging routes and generally having a good time. speaking of which, kennie you would have loved this...

we found an old tunnel that was rather fun. to get to it we had to climb down a ladder, which sounds easy, but not while wearing snowshoes! absolutely worth it though.

and what better way to enjoy our evening than to listen to monicas group of gifted friends. krista sang beautifully in that irish style that the cranberries made popular - except she was just as good than they were. and of course, mon on the right who has a talent for getting the most musically of everyone just by being kind and encouraging (i should know, she encouraged me to start learning guitar - though i am still rubbish!)

oh and krista's husband, dave sang this brilliant song that he wrote and promised to send me the words and chords to learn (gentle reminder there.)

we all went to bed tired but happy with a beautiful day.