No, not that type of one too many. One too many drinks or donuts is never a good thing and usually fits under the category ‘it seemed like a good idea at the time’. No, I mean pushing a season just a bit past its best-before date. In my case, going out just one more time after that perfect hike, swim, or snowshoe at the end of the season.
Snowshoe Season
We haven’t had much snow this year, but as I wrote in The Secret Lives of Animals, my winter joy is strapping on my snowshoes and following animal tracks. With warm weather on the way I took advantage of a sunny afternoon in mid-March and went snowshoeing up the hill behind my house along an old wood road. I hadn’t gone far when I saw fresh tracks – first a pair of coyotes, then a moose. I followed the tracks up until they all fed into a narrow trail I’d cut through new growth blocking the road. I was pretty chuffed that the critters were using my trail, but it was too narrow for snowshoes, so I headed back down, past some grouse tracks. (These photos were taken a couple of days later, hence not-so-fresh or clear, and with human tracks alongside. They’re a bit better full size.)
I crossed the slope over to a trail, then went down, down, down to Little River. The river was beautiful. The boulders wore icy skullcaps and stranded branches were festooned with fairy goblets and lacy necklaces of glittering ice. I paused to admire Winter’s Art Gallery, then snowshoed downstream. Before long I spotted small tracks emerging from the open water, up a steep slope, and along the riverbank. It was a mink, I think. Next came the tracks of a coyote who’d crossed the river, and, farther along, a second coyote who’d crossed over.
By chance I found myself following in the footsteps, so to speak, of these two coyotes on my way back home. We all took the same route away from the river and through the woods, but I parted ways when their tracks went straight up a very steep slope. I was almost home when I crossed their paths again. The coyote tracks went up the hill through the forest – and then out onto the old wood road above my house. This was the same coyote pair I’d started tracking when I first set out. I’d come full circle. Perfect! It was the best snowshoe I’d had in a couple of winters.
One Too Many Snowshoes
What a great way to finish up the season, right? Wrong. Of course I had to try to squeeze in just one more snowshoe before the snow disappeared. A couple of days later I set off with hope in my heart, detouring to take the track photos before heading off in the opposite direction, away from the river. It wasn’t a complete loss. I did see the tracks of a mother moose with her yearling, and a depression left by a sleeping moose. But I also had to snowshoe across moss and grass, jump over streams of snow-melt, and detour around puddles to get back onto the icy snow crust. April and the Albedo Effect was in full swing, even though it was only mid-March. It was my one-too-many snowshoe hike.
I’ve done ‘one-too-many’ snowshoe hikes so often that it has become a Rite of Spring. A fantastic snowshoe must be followed by a rotten one. Sometime literally. When deep snow rots from below, I might break through up to my knees, as described in April – Awful or Awesome?
So why do it? Why not end on that perfect note, that ideal snowshoe? I can trace the whole one-too-many business back to 2019. I had a sublime snowshoe one brilliant blue-sky afternoon at the end of March. I’d seen lots of animal signs and enjoyed views of two waterfalls. I paused on a hilltop and looked back across the expanse of pristine white snow, shining under the sun and stretching to the next hill. I felt a deep sense of belonging, of being in the exact right time and place in the universe.
The snow had started to rot in the woods, but I couldn’t resist going again the next day, trying for just one more day of bliss. Hardly bliss. The conditions were atrocious. I tried an old wood road to the ocean, I tried through the woods to the river, but everywhere I went I kept breaking through the rotting snow. It was all frustration and no fun. I cursed myself for not having the sense to finish the season on a high note. But later I realized that ending on a sour note wasn’t all bad. It meant that I had pushed the season to its limit and a bit beyond. There was no second-guessing if I coulda/woulda/shoulda gone out one more time. And the one-too-many didn’t tarnish my memory of that perfect, penultimate snowshoe.
After my one-too-many snowshoe this year, I washed the mud off my snowshoes (no lie!) and stored them away. Why so reluctant to call it quits? Partly because now there is a pause. There is too little snow to snowshoe, but too much to bushwhack through the forest. So now I wait. And wait. Until the snow melts enough to swing into – spring hiking!
Spring Hiking Season
I don’t really ‘hike’ so much as mosey through the forest, bushwhacking up and down the highland slopes. I follow freshets and brooks flowing from the highland plateau, linger in hemlock stands, and watch waterfalls tumble down. I explore new places and revisit to my special spots, as described in The Humbled Hiker.
I head for the hills as soon as the snow melts. I live and play in a mixed forest, so there is a time before the trees leaf out at the end of May that is ideal for exploring. The lack of leaves allows for more open vistas, better ocean views, and easier route-finding. But before the veil of leaves appears, a spring scourge drops the curtain on my spring hikes. I jotted down these notes a few years ago:
One Too Many Spring Hikes
“I went on ‘one too many’ hikes the other day. I realized it as I was beating off black flies during one of my Highland explorations. The black flies won this bout, and even the dreadful DEET didn’t stop their frenzy. The plan had been to climb part way up a ridge to a hemlock stand, and see how far I could traverse along that slope. I aborted my plan once I reached the hemlock stand. I just wasn’t having fun anymore.
I enjoyed the ocean view – briefly – and the towering hemlocks – briefly – and then made my way down slope and out onto the cutline where the gusty southwest winds kept the little buggers at bay. I set out on this walk somewhat tentatively. The flies had exploded a week earlier and were annoying on a couple of previous treks, but not enough to spoil the walk.
In fact, my previous walk to a waterfall had been delightful. There were flies, here and there, and it wasn’t a good time to linger by the water, but it was worthwhile. So why not end on that high note? Because fomo. Fear of missing out on one more wonderful walk in the woods. I didn’t regret my last bushwhack, even though I had to flee from the blackflies. That one-too-many hike confirmed what I had suspected: Time to stash away the hiking gear.”
So there you have it. If a lack of snow marks the end of snowshoe season, an abundance of black flies has me fleeing the forest each spring. They breed in fresh running water – abundant on the highland slopes – and usually emerge in mid-May. I find the wee pests so distracting that it’s hard to focus on my footing, which is dangerous as well as frustrating. As my notes suggest, I’d had a wonderful walk to a waterfall that would have made for a grand finale, but I just had to push my luck.
As with the end of snowshoe season, there is a hiatus after spring hiking. The black flies are biting but the ocean is still frigid – and it takes a long, long time to warm up. So I must bide my time before I can dive into …. swim season!
Swim Season
Ah, summer in Cape Breton. We are blessed with an abundance of places to swim: lakes, rivers, and ponds galore – including my own L’il Pond (Swimming with Frogs). But my favourite place to swim is the ocean. And by ‘swim’ I mean being immersed in water. I might swim a few strokes, then roll over and float on my back and gaze at the clouds bobbing by above. Or I might do a little bobbing myself, gently rocked by the waves while I watch the terns and gulls and gannets. I’m a prairie girl who fell in love with the ocean and I feel happiest when I’m held in her briny embrace.
Summer is sun, suds, sand, swimming in the salty sea, and a smiling Sue. The perfect beach day is hanging out with friends, going for a swim, drying off in the hot sun with a cold drink, then diving back into water. Repeat.
One Too Many Swims
Unlike snowshoeing or hiking, there can be one-too-many swims in a single day as well as a season. The water is so tempting and the air so warm, but that last swim of the day can be a bit risky. The air temperature drops abruptly when the sun drops behind the highlands. One swim too many and I might get … the dreaded chill. Cold that gets so deep into my bones that there’s only one cure. I have to go home and get immersed again – in a nice hot bath.
Swim season in Cape Breton is sweet but vanishingly short, which is why I try to get in the water every day that the weather allows. That’s also why I push the season and end up diving in one-too-many (or even two-too-many or three-too-many) times, because it’s a long while before beach season rolls back around. Here’s a (lightly-edited) passage from my diary dated Sept. 15th, 2023. (Mervi is my beach buddy (pictured above) who is a glass blower, which is very hot work.)
“Went for a beach walk and to see waves ahead of (tropical storm) Lee. Wore tights and a cotton shirt but threw in my swimsuit and towel in at last minute. After walking in the tidal wash I felt quite warm and a couple of tourists were in the waves. It was cloudy but warm and humid. Tourists said they felt fine getting out, so after they left I put on my swimsuit – still damp from previous swim – and immediately felt chilly. Considered putting clothes back on but opted to wait for Mervi. She was hot from glass blowing and went right in. I waded out but a biggish wave soaked me almost to my neck so, after hesitating, I dove under and floated a bit cuz probably final swim.
Got out and brrr – cold. Needed to get out of wet swimsuit. Tried to wrap a towel around and change back into dry clothes but skin so clammy I couldn’t really get really dry … everything sticking and icky … I felt all chilly and clammy and sticky. Yuck! Wished I hadn’t gone in. But it was okay, I told Mervi, because this had been my one-too-many swim.”
Swim season is the hardest one of all for me to let go. And sometimes we do get a surprise blast of heat late in the season. But there comes a time when the heat has gone out of the air and the ocean is cooling down. A time to rinse out of all my beach gear and store it away, to accept that swim season is over for another year.
The consolation is that there isn’t any waiting around for the next fun activity to begin. Just as the ocean turns grey and cold, the forest begins to glow with red, gold, yellow, and orange. The autumn woods are warm and welcoming, blazing with colour and fecund with fungi. Fall hiking season begins when swim season ends, and carries on through November, as I wrote in my very first (and very short) blog Bared Trees and Barred Owls. But one day the snow will fall and stay put, hiding all the hazards underfoot. Then it’s that in-between time again – too much snow to bushwhack but not enough to form a good base for snowshoeing. It’s time to wait for more snow so the seasonal cycle can start all over again.
One Too Many and Me
This one-too-many thing is a sign of my reluctance to switch gears. Even if that means shifting into neutral and idling until I can start my next fun outdoor activity. But doing something one-too-many times is also a strategy of sorts. It’s a way of forcing me to face the facts, ma’am – this season is over.
If the ideal snowshoe, hike, or beach day is a perfectly-crafted sentence, the one-too-many day is the period that ends the sentence and closes out that chapter. For me, one too many is just about right. Happy April everyone!
Sue McKay Miller
April 6th, 2025
Sue McKay Miller 