It's been a long, hard winter in much of the U.S., a bummer if you hate scraping ice off your car windows in the morning. But for people who love snow, like me, winter is a playground.
I set off on my snowshoes on a classically cold day, just 19 degrees Fahrenheit when I hit the trail. The trees are frosted with snow.
I'm bundled up from head to toe, which means I'm warm. One thing I love about winter hiking is that the right boots and layers of clothes you really can feel cozy and comfortable, even when exploring places like this.
Soon the trail takes me along the edge of a cliff where there are cascades of ice, some bright yellow, some glowing blue. The fangs of ice are like sculpture.
I'm not alone out here. Every half hour or so a flock of chickadees swirls around me. They seem curious, some so brave they almost settle on my outstretched glove.
I hike on. There are patches of blue sky through the trees, big sweeps of sunshine on the snow. It's cold though. My breath freezes in my beard.
I snowshoe up over a ridge and descend into a valley that feels completely solitary and wild. The stillness of deep winter is broken only by the drumming of a woodpecker in the tree canopy. Its echoing sound makes the forest seem even more vast.
Before long, I push beyond where anybody else has gone since the last heavy snowfall. That means I'm forced to break trail, wading through snow that's up to my knees and sometimes up to my waist.
Finally I come to the edge of a frozen lake called Wolf Pond. There's still running water here, a little river that flows under the ice, breaking in places over black rocks.
My snowshoes make a different kind of sound on the lake ice, a sharp crunch that breaks the stillness.
The big mountains of the High Peaks Wilderness rise on the horizon, glacial and white, the sky smoky with clouds.
As I stop to rest and drink black coffee from my thermos, snow starts to fall again, big flakes bright against the February forest.
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