Drove out to Palmyra this morning to hike a stretch of the Blackhawk segment of the Ice Age Trail. The drive takes about one hour each way and I wanted to get back before dark, which at this time of year drops pretty quickly shortly after four-thirty, so I wouldn’t be driving through rush-hour traffic alongside a bunch of idiots who hadn’t turned their headlights on yet.

My hike today covered about 2.6 miles of the northern end of the Blackhawk Segment. I hiked 4.5 miles of the southern end as far as Shelter 3 back in February, so this was me coming back to finish off the segment. I kind of forgot where I turned around to double back last time, so I ended up walking about half a mile of trail I hiked back in February. I didn’t fully realize that at the time but I did have a weirdly deja vu-ish feeling as I was walking the overlapping part of the trail.

Today’s hike was an out-and-back, same as in February, so I ended up walking a total of 7.4 miles.

It was a gorgeous day for a hike, sunny and clear with temps in the 40s. I got chilled in the shadows behind the hills but spent more time on the sunny hilltops to get warmed all the way through, a more than even trade-off. About two-thirds of the time I was walking on trail covered in ice or snow, so I had to pull crampons over my boots to make sure I didn’t slip and fall down the hillside. Where the ice and snow had melted away, the trail was mostly dry, but even in the puddly spots it was easy to find sure footing on the solidly-frozen grass or dirt alongside the trail.

I met only two other hikers along the trail: one guy who seemed to be speed-walking the trail and looked tired, and another guy out with his dog. The dog was not on a leash but was trained and well-behaved. And, while I was stretched out on a bench eating a fig bar, a couple of hunters emerged from the brush right in front of me. After saying hello, they walked in circles for three or four minutes, trying to get their bearings before disappearing from sight into the brush again.