Chirico Trail

Saturday and Sunday were excellent days. We went out and rode Carnation Valley and the hills of Newcastle. I feel like I absolutely suck on the hills, but Jim assures me it's not that bad. This coming after he has dropped me on each and every hill. But hey, the old folks are out there.
Here is a trail side wild sweet pea. There are a lot of them this year.

Today was a recovery day so we did the Chirico Trail hike. How dumb can we get? It's only 1.7 miles, but it's really really hard. The backs of my calves hurt from over stretching on the the straight up parts of the trail. It's ok, it feels so good when we stop. We need a less vertical recovery hike.

What, I ask you, is the first rule of successful RV ownership? Give up? Never back up without a ground guide. Ever. Replacing the cap on the sewer out-fall is important, but not backing without someone watching behind the RV is paramount. First this gentleman drove his motor home through the Chirico parking lot, which was surprising because it's very narrow; then he exited, made a right, and pulled off Issaquah-Hobart road onto the shoulder next to a low guardrail. Then he proceeded to throw it in to reverse, (no one got out of the coach prior to backing up) and backed in to the guardrail. The low square post he hit went in between the two broken sections of RV body, when he pulled away from the fence he damaged it further. He should have stopped and sawed off the cracked part prior to pulling forward. As it is, he's looking at somewhere between 5 and 10 thousand dollars worth of damage. Bet he won't do that again!!

I would have loved to have overheard this conversation. Or not.

Here is the top of the trail at Poo-Poo Point.

Jim going back down the trail.

And here is Dave, our former next door neighbor from Issaquah. We have run into him on this trail in July 2008, 2010 and now this year. It's just weird how that happens. He's walking up to the para-glider jumping off place with his 40 pound pack of equipment.

This is all I have to report. Over and out.