I did a day hike with my long time hiking partner and neighbor, Randy, and our new neighbor, Brad, today out at Hercules Glades Wilderness. Brad's the newbie.

We did about 6 miles in the NE corner of the park. Brad wanted to do a loop on the Pees Hollow trail that was closer to 8 miles but I've been wanting to bushwhack the bottom of the hollows in that section for a couple years now and I managed to sweet talk them into it splitting it up. It's the one section of the park I hadn't ever hiked much. Just enough on the trails that mainly track the tops of the ridges to peek down into a couple of the bigger hollows there.

The bushwhacks we've done with Brad behind our homes are pretty tough. It's just a vicious steep rocky hollow with deep cuts in it and thick as can be with lots of rock and bramble, so Brad has been a little put off with Randy and I's bushwhacking and has been looking for some easier trail hiking. I understand that, but the really good stuff at HRW is off trail and it's a lot easier there than what we have in our back yard and there's just no way I can stay on the trails.

So we started at the Lookout Tower and headed north on the trail for about 1/4 mile and then headed down into Pees Hollow to find a Spring shown on some of the maps I have. From there we just followed bottom down towards Brushy Creek. A couple miles down the trail crossed the bottom of the hollow we were in and we'd follow it back to the car. It's a steep climb down to the Spring but really pretty easy. We sort of found the Spring, but it wasn't gushing, it was just a little bit of water trickling out of the rocks at the bottom of the hollow, but it's also the very beginning of where a wet weather creek forms that gets pretty big down further.

Down in this bottom is where Brad began to see the beauty in bushwhacking here. We just meandered slowly down the bottom exploring all the nooks and crannies. It was just incredibly beautiful. In the creek bed there were pools of water and sheets of ice, and ice falls that would appear and then disappear under the rock for hundreds of yards sometimes. There were game trails and huge old trees and fantastic places to set up a camp for a night or two where no one ever goes.

When we reach the trail where it crosses the bottom Brad said to me "Now I understand why you bushwhack. We'd never get to see all that from the trail."

We took the west side of the Pees Hollow trail loop we started on about half way back and before it headed downhill we bushwhacked over the ridge to another trail west of it and took it back to the Lookout Tower, which was a much faster and easier hike.

When we got back to the car we reviewed our route and the trails marked on the maps and GPSs and what we'd seen and Brad now has a different view of hiking and backpacking and trails. He sees it more like Randy and I do.

Trails are a tool, not a boundary. When viewed this way they are like a piece of gear that you use sometimes.