I had off for Veterans Day, and originally planned a much longer hike, but when the day dawned frigid and snowy, Corrie and I decided to do something much shorter and lower in elevation so we headed to Little River State Park.  I’d been there before on a quick, after work hike, but was looking forward to seeing more of it.  I’m usually the one who plans the hikes I go on but Corrie knows the park really well so I just followed her.

We arrived at the Stephenson Brook Trailhead to see one other guy there, and we shared a laugh at being the only ones out in the 15° temperature.  Then we rushed onto the trail to try to get warm.  The first winter hike of the season is always rough as I seem to forget how winter works and what layers to wear, etc.  There was an inch or so of snow where we started, but it got deeper the farther into the woods we went.

We eventually warmed up and the sun started to peak out here and there.  Once we got up to the Sawmill Trail, we started seeing old artifacts covered in snow, and then lots of farm ruins on the Dalley Loop Trail.  I love seeing ruins and even more love seeing old, tiny cemeteries in the woods.

The sun ended up going away again, and it was getting fairly blustery, so when faced with the decision to make a longer or shorter loop, we chose the shorter one.  Once back to the road, the walk back to our original trailhead was downright bitter.  Even though we’d only hiked 4 or 5 miles, we decided that due to the cold, we still deserved to stop and split a hot pizza.