Whenever the world makes me weary, I escape to a local park and go hiking with my dogs. This 35 degree morning had some glorious sunshine which was perfect for a hike at the Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore's West Beach. We did the Long Lake Loop Hike which is a favorite of mine.
The NPS has done a prescribed burn along the trail from the Long Lake parking lot to the NPS garage area. The only thing left in this area is the Eastern Prickly Pear Cactus that can be found throughout this park.
Oslo & Nola thrilled to be out on a hike today.
It is suppose to snow later today. But it is a beautiful morning for a hike right now.
You can see the difference with the burn area on the left and the intact forest area on the right.
Even though it still feels like winter around here, the birds are singing like it is springtime especially along the Long Lake shoreline.
Sunbeams on the water...
...even when looking down from a sand dune.
Oslo taking a break after climbing up the stairs...
...Nola on the lookout. There were so many different bird sounds in the forest and then frogs croaking in the wetlands.
Looking east over Long Lake.
Hiking the dune ridge line west along the lake.
One of the reasons I love this hike is the roller coaster trail...up and down with twists and turns. Going down...
...heading back up the dunes.
This was a really good prescribed burn along the ground because some leaves only a few feet off the ground did not burn.
A little bit of everything along this hike. Down off the dunes into a forest then wetlands at the bottom with all kinds of amphibian sounds.
We crossed the entrance road and continued along the Long Lake Loop trail which heads through the forest and into some good sized sand dunes.
There are very few signs of spring due to our extended winter weather in the Chicagoland area.
There aren't many big trees on the dunes but this evergreen has to be at least 100 feet tall.
The Lake Michigan view from atop the dune along the trail.
Due to safety concerns of unseen holes in the dunes, most of them are blocked off to hikers.
But you can hike up and down this one on the Long Lake trail.
Nola wanted to run...
...but Oslo took his time walking down.
I purposely hiked this trail clockwise from the parking lot so we hiked down this dune at the end instead of hiking up it at the beginning. I told myself that it was to protect Oslo but in reality it was probably self preservation too.
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