hiking the Kettle Moraine

Some friends invited us hiking, in the spring. They're trying to hike the entire Ice Age National Scenic Trail. Right now, it's 600 miles of trail, plus 600 miles of on-road connecting routes, all in Wisconsin. It's mostly on glacial terrain. They go out on weekends and do ten or twelve miles. We never got out schedules together until this fall, and finally made plans for yesterday. It turned out that she was not feeling well, so it was just me, Cindy and Brook.

We hiked a section on the west side of West Bend. We haven't done much hiking lately, so we opted for a shorter segment. It was only eight miles. Brook said it should be relatively flat. Except for the part that was on city sidewalks, he was wrong. It was glacial moraine all the way, and very hilly. I was hurting. First my knees and down into my shins. Then my hips. This morning, my feet are stiff.

But the hike was beautiful! It was eighty degrees, with a pleasant breeze. Sunny, with the trees turning. It was just perfect.