Hike to die for

Saturday’s hiking adventure was excellent in several ways, but a dramatic reminder of just how long it’s been since I did any hiking. The morning fungi foray was not demanding. The main problem was keeping warm as we did not move very much — too many mushrooms littered the forest floor. The leader and her husband were very knowledgeable, sharing just enough info to keep it interesting without making it a botany lesson. With special permission from National Parks to take specimens, we picked nearly two dozen varieties of fungi, about half of them edible.
The afternoon hike took us to Bootleggers’ Cave, right on the shoreline within Bruce Peninsula National Park. The official trail guide describes it thus: “considered to be the most rugged and challenging hiking along the whole length of the Bruce Trail.” No kidding. I wasn’t sure I would make it in a couple of spots, but pressed on regardless. Pretty brutal way to reacquaint myself with the joys of hiking, but yes, I made it all the way to the cave, and even to Cave Point, the highest cliff within the park. You would never find the cave without a guide in the know, and the whole thing was pretty spectacular, except for the part where I thought I was going to keel over and get eaten by a bear. Oh yeah, first obstacle on the trail path was bear scat. Big pile.