A spectacular hike up Little O'Malley with the Walkabout hiking group from Anchorage. I was feeling extremely weak at first and wondered if I would even be able to continue on the hike. The loss of my little dog, Baby has been weighing heavily on my mind, and it is starting to drain me physically as well. The trail was lovely and actually very nicely maintained with nice new boardwalks and even wooden staircases on some of the steeper parts. Instead of what used to be a rather straight up trail, there were now very nice switchbacks, making traveling quite comfortable even on the steep uphill parts. There were a few muddy and snowy sections but we were easily able to navigate around them. Once we got to the actual Little O'Malley peak we took a nice break. Some of the group decided to head down because of other obligations. But those who continued had a few snacks then continued on across the big area known as the ballfield. We kept trying to get to spots that offered good views of the valley below. Dale, Shelley, Dela, Pam and I were the ones who continued on with this little exploration adventure across the tundra. It was mostly just gentle walking over small hills and across small areas of well traveled snow. We had great views of O'Malley Peak, Deep Lake plus Williwaw Lakes and Black Lake down in the valley. Deep Lake was still frozen but had some water on top of the ice that was a gorgeous glacier blue. We wandered in this beautiful place for quite some time, and finally descended, logging over 9 miles by the time we got back to our cars. It was a long day but a lovely one.
I had thoughts of Baby with me the whole time. She would have loved this hike.
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