What’s the best outdoor activity in cold weather? Taking a hike. This weekend you can do it in a swamp atop a gorgeous Appalachian Mountain and over two high points of the Uwharrie Trail.
Coast
The best time to hike in a swamp? Right about now, when the temperatures are keeping all the creepy, crawly, bitey critters at bay. And the best way to hike a swamp? Elevated, on a boardwalk.
Monday — never an easy time for the outdoors enthusiast. After a weekend of adventure, returning to the humdrum work-a-day world can make one melancholy. To help ease the transition, every Monday we feature a 90 Second Escape — essentially, a 90-second video or slide show of a place you’d probably rather be: a trail, a park, a greenway, a lake … anywhere as long as it’s not under a fluorescent bulb.
We all resolve to be healthier and more active at the start of the new year. What we don’t always realize is that a healthier lifestyle is a day-by-day undertaking.
That said, get your first day of your active new year off to a good start with a hike. Hiking is one of the more traditional ways to start the blood flowing on January 1. (Jumping into an icy lake is another; we’ve tried that and don’t recommend it if you intend to keep the blood flowing.) Fortunately, there are lots of hike options on New Year’s Day, thanks to the First Day Hikes initiative launched a few years back by the nation’s state parks.
Start the year with a traditional polar plunge at the coast, then head to higher, drier and warmer ground for a hike.
Coast
We would be remiss if, in this New Year’s edition of Weekend Plans, we didn’t include at least one polar plunge, that peculiar tradition born in the north where we strip down to our skivvies and immerse ourselves in water that hasn’t frozen over — though in some northern climes the tradition requires drilling a hole through the frozen-over lake surface, then jumping in. An impressive level of lunacy.
Monday — never an easy time for the outdoors enthusiast. After a weekend of adventure, returning to the humdrum work-a-day world can make one melancholy. To help ease the transition, every Monday we feature a 90 Second Escape — essentially, a 90-second video or slide show of a place you’d probably rather be: a trail, a park, a greenway, a lake … anywhere as long as it’s not under a fluorescent bulb.