New Years Day Hike...

 Happy New Years to some of you today.  We took a hike this afternoon to the Carver Rapids on the Minnesota River with our new snowshoes...

The last normal thing I did last spring before the world went to hell and everything was cancelled was take a snowshoe lacing workshop at Gooseberry Falls.  I laced a pair of Ojibwa snowshoes and planned to take another workshop this fall making a pair of urban shoes.  Well that workshop was cancelled but I decided to lace them on my own...then I decided I should lace three more pairs for Christmas presents to the kids...

It was the first time that Lex's pair had seen snow...

The pairs I laced for them are sized for their later adult heights/weights...so these should last and have plenty of opportunity for usage in the coming years...

We went to the lower rapids on the Minnesota River...when the river is low you can see the Jordan Sandstone that forms the rapids, historically, the rapids were a major impediment to travel up the river and certainly play a role in why the towns of Carver & Chaska are located where they are.  In 2011, I did a post on my geology blog (which I haven't added to in years) on the rapids that can be found here...

 

Of course we needed to grab one quick selfie near the end of the hike...

It was a fun day...and tiring as well...