In today’s post, I’ll look back at a couple of hikes done in October dating before this blog, with a handful of pictures. Seeing them myself, it’s hard to believe some of those memories are almost a decade old already…

The first hike I’ll share is, as of today, exactly 10 years ago – 27.10.2014. A day that was a good demonstration of how can a cool autumn morning turn into a warm day even this late in the year. This was a spontaneous hike with my parents based on the good forecast. The morning was just above freezing but the sunny weather promised to get warmer, more so once we’d start going uphill.

Remains of mist clung to the hills, giving the land preparing for its winter rest a typical autumn vibe. But I remember this hike mostly by the photo below, a group of larch trees i their autumn garb between evergreen spruces.

This was taken roughly half-way through the hike, at which time, the sun and us being on the move kept us warmer than the cold morning in the valley, and the remains of autumn fog were gone from the hills.

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In October 2015, I went on two hikes. The first was, in a way, quite ordinary. It was mostly just a walk through the land in hopes of seeing some colorful trees or maybe mushrooms. Some trees, especially, decided to wear all colors at once in a perfect palette.

While others were fine with just one.

And the view from the lookout mid-way through was made all the nicer given the colors around.

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That said, a more memorable hike took place three weeks later. At first, it seemed to be quite miserable – we shared the train compartment with a group that had a dog and, as I didn’t think to take my allergy pills, I spent a good part of the day sneezing a lot, even long since we left the train. This hike was something I planned to do solo but three or so people from the hiking club joined me. My goal was to reach a place where I took one memorable photo years ago and try to recreate it.

Unfortunately, by the time I reached the place – which I recognized easily – the mist that made the original photo what it was had mostly evaporated.

That said, we still had some nice autumn views, such as the contrast between the bright yellow leaves of a birch tree growing at the edge of a spruce wood.

As well as some other yellowing trees around the fields.

Given that I wasn’t alone, the pace was slower than I expected and we reached the train station when it was getting darker. The journey also wasn’t perfect as we had quite some downtime at one station – which became another major memory. As I stared from the station into the darkness, I saw a meteor fall, which was definitely a unique moment for a hike.

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Another colorful hike was in early October 2016, two weeks after one of the hikes I mentioned last week. Especially the morning sun made the woods shine.

By my memory, this was a hike of the easier sort, with a gentle ascension and then just as gently weaving up and down through the surrounding area with a couple of cozy chalets on the way.

The morning also wasn’t that cold, and the day was pleasant – not too warm but nowhere near cold, just enough for a light hoodie to be comfortable. This was a return to a place I visited before, but from the other direction, so the only point this hike shared with its predecessor was one of the chalets midway through.

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And one more colorful hike that was two weeks after the previous one. It was relatively close and started at a low mountain pass – the same pass as the hike with a mix of snow and rain this spring, though back in 2016, we took a different trail after the first branching. The low morning sun and the shade cast by the higher mountains nearby led to the photos having a darker feeling.

And some of the mountains we saw were sprinkled with a thin layer of snow already, but we were low enough to avoid that. So, we enjoyed the weakening autumn sunlight as well as the colorful woods.

Though descending the final peak was a bit damp and muddy at times and thus required some cauting on the descent. But that’s also quite the part of autumn hikes.

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So, that’s it for this look into past hikes. Hopefully the last for a while and I’ll have something fresher to show soon.