Happy Mothers Day! 🌷

As ol Merle Haggard would say, there are two kinds of Mothers. I’ve been called a mother before but I’ve not had any kids.

Good morning! Partly sunny and 43 degrees at the Cole Hill State Forest. 🌞 There is a north breeze at 9 mph. 🍃. Temperatures will drop below freezing at Thursday around 3 am. ☃️

Kind of a cold start to the morning 🥶 sleeping in the hammock. I wish I had brought more blankets but I survived. I wanted to go as minimally as possible and it gave me an excuse to get up and going at day break like I normally do.

Went for a nice walk to start the day, 🚶 roughly five miles after taking down camp. Hiked some of the Long Path and the trail around the swamp. Had a small fire 🔥 last night, nothing major as I was wilderness camping and it was breezy though the flip side was there was an established fire pit there. Next time I go up there I’ll make sure to bring a chair as sitting on the stone I stacked wasn’t all that comfortable. No bugs but by morning it was pretty cold.

Today will be mostly sunny 🌞, with a high of 59 degrees at 3pm. 12 degrees below normal, which is similar to a typical day around April 15th. Northwest wind 9 to 11 mph. Going to be a cool day. A year ago, we had partly cloudy skies in the morning with some clearing in the afternoon. It was somewhat humid. The high last year was 84 degrees. The record high of 93 was set in 1900.

The plan is to have a nice pan 🍳 of eggs 🥚 when I get home with lots of spinach and feta cheese and then get my clothes 👚 unpacked from the wash yesterday, go to the car wash 🚿, get groceries, top of the tank in my truck, ⛽ put the tire back on my truck 🛻 and then maybe in the evening 🌃 go for a walk. 🚶 Maybe just the town park or Five Rivers though I was thinking about Norman’s Kill Falls or maybe the Rail Trail to the Bender Mellon Preserve. 🍉

Solar noon 🌞 is at 12:54 pm with sun having an altitude of 66° from the due south horizon (-4.9° vs. 6/21). A six foot person will cast a 2.7 foot shadow today compared to 2.2 feet on the first day of summer. The golden hour 🏅 starts at 7:30 pm with the sun in the west-northwest (290°). 📸

I saw at the trailhead 📄 somebody left a note about the passing of Forest Ranger Tom Edmunds. He used to patrol Burnt Rossman State Forest but I only met him once. I think he got transfered to Vermontville in the Northern Adirondacks a few years back. 🏋️ Just another reminder how short life can be and why it’s important to eat healthy and exercise.

The sunset is in the west-northwest (297°) with the sun dropping below the horizon at 8:11 pm after setting for 3 minutes and 13 seconds with dusk around 8:42 pm, which is one minute and 4 seconds later than yesterday. 🌇 The best time to look at the stars is after 9:23 pm. At sunset, look for mostly clear skies 🌄 and temperatures around 52 degrees. There will be a north-northwest breeze at 10 mph. Today will have 14 hours and 37 minutes of daytime, an increase of 2 minutes and 8 seconds over yesterday.

Tonight will be mostly clear 🌃, with a low of 39 degrees at 5am. Nine degrees below normal, which is similar to a typical night around April 21st. Northwest wind 8 to 10 mph. In 2022, we had mostly clear skies in the evening, which became partly cloudy by the early hours of the morning. It was humid. It got down to 64 degrees. The record low of 31 occurred back in 1977.

I’m going to keep that campsite ⛺ in mind for Memorial Day Weekend in case I decide to do a quick overnight. Probably stay to close to home that holiday weekend as it depends on how much work I have to do. Hammock Camping is easy especially for a quick overnight. Next weekend is the Lupine Festival 🦋 and the first week of June if it’s nice I’ll either do Schoharie or Charles Baker and truck camp, especially if I have my bicycle 🚲 up and running by then. Second week of June I’ll probably be exhausted from work but I want to go with dad to the Gas Up, third weekend is Juneteenth Weekend and want to do four or five days at Piseco-Powley, taking off the Friday before Juneteenth Weekend so I can get the House Pond Campsite and if it’s more than three nights go up to Powley Place on the Sunday / Monday night when I can enjoy it without neighbors.

Looking ahead, there are 4 weeks until the Gas Up ⛽ 🚜 when the sun will be setting at 8:35 pm with dusk at 9:08 pm. On that day in 2022, we had partly sunny and temperatures between 78 and 50 degrees. Typically, the high temperature is 78 degrees. We hit a record high of 94 back in 1947.