The first month of 2024 gave me some options for hiking, while also taking some away. But it was a successful start to the year.

My plan was to start the year with a hike on the 1st, but the weather was very much against – heavy rain since the early morning, and I decided to cancel and instead focus on different hobbies.

On the 6th, the first club hike was planned. Unfortunately, the weather wasn’t much better. Instead of a heavy rain, it was a light but persistent rain that turned into a mix of rain and snow near the peak, and at the very peak, to snow only. Still, the heavy gray clouds and low visibility gave limited chances for photos. This time, my sister and her friend joined me, and I spent the first half of the ascension with them, but then adjusted to my own pace (this being a frequent and well-known spot, I knew they’d be fine).

The weather changed to one that fits the season over the next week, and even the lower portions of the hills got some snow. I decided to take advantage of this fact and went for a hike that was very similar to my 2021 opening hike.

The damp but cold weather had its way with the landscape, painting the forest white by quite a large amount of ice clinging to the trees. Sometimes enough to bend the thinner branches.

The skies were still mostly gray, though, so I enjoyed the forest’s state more than the surroundings.

The snow melted in the lowlands during the following week, but remained in the hills, so I took the chance and returned to the same peak where I faced rain two weeks before. This time, with much better results.

The skies were clear at the peak I was visiting, and some of the nearby ones, but the same couldn’t be said about some other mountains – the photo above probably doesn’t show it well, but there are clouds grasping some of those mountains from behind, so to say. The following photo makes it clearer.

That was also in the eastward direction, where only some of the higher peaks broke the cloud cover.

While the hills I visited a week before were also enjoying some sun.

The following day, I departed for the concert I mentioned in my monthly summary. Unfortunately, the train that was going around 0:50 back before COVID was returned to operation with several stops cut, including the one where I would’ve boarded it. Thus, I had to wait until 3:20. Given the cold night with clear skies, I decided to walk from the venue to the train station on the main railroad (around 13km).

This was an interesting experience, not so much because of the dark, but because I had to keep my pace low (to avoid standing at the station in the cold) despite my instincts that had me urging to pick up the pace to warm myself up. To achieve that, I was making frequent stops to stretch and thus warm up my upper body.

The last Saturday of the month was, again, cloudy. This time, the club had a short suburb walk scheduled, so it was more to relax rather than exercise, but I welcomed that to see some interesting parts nearby. This included visiting a wooden church from the late 1600s and the local museum.

Despite the not-always-ideal weather, I’m glad that I managed to go for at least a short walk every weekend, and I hope I’ll keep this up during February.