Three Beautiful Things 04/21/2021: Cimbing Mt Fernan, Patio Bliss, The Promise of Sleep

1.  I woke up this morning in anticipation of a really good day lying ahead. First, I fed Luna and Copper and I squirted a painkiller and an antibiotic down Luna's throat, not particularly to her delight. 

I revved up the Sube, then, and blasted over the 4th of July Pass to Coeur d'Alene and met Byrdman at his house. 

We piled in his pickup and Byrdman powered us up to a trailhead so we could hike in the Fernan Lake Natural Area. We hiked about two miles in all. The trhail was pretty well suited to my current physical condition. It tested my wind and legs with some of its ascents, but also gave me some breaks with descents and some level areas. I enjoyed gazing below us, mostly at Fernan Lake, but we also got some views of Lake Coeur d'Alene and some of the town of CdA. 

I'm glad the air was pretty cool, but, all the same, I had to peel off my light hooded sweatshirt and the long sleeved shirt under it by the end, leaving me in a T-shirt. Even though it wasn't hot out, the sun itself was beginning to sap my energy by the end, but I made it to the conclusion of our hike and this outing helped further assuage concerns I had a week ago about my well being.

I was breathing kind of hard and glad to be sitting down at the end, but I felt great.

2. Byrdman and  I looked at some costly houses on up the road above the trailhead before heading back to Coeur d'Alene and making our way to the Ponderosa Par 3 golf course. Fairly recently, Tom Capone bought and took over the bar and grill at the Ponderosa, renaming it Capone's Pub on the Green. Byrdman suggested we take advantage of the outdoor patio at the pub, have a cold foamy or two, and decide about eating. 

It was perfect on the patio and the golf course laid out before us was lush looking, enhanced by a fountain in the middle of a pond between one and two hundred yards away.

I ordered a Widmer's Hefeweisen, a classic beer from the early days of craft brewing in Portland and it was perfect, like having a reunion with an old friend. 

We yakked for a while and decided to stay put for lunch and I enjoyed a thick hamburger and fries. Sitting on this patio, solving the world's problems with Byrdman, enjoying the mild weather and the nearly cloudless sky while drinking a couple of pints and eating bar food made me feel like time had stopped and I was in a bubble of bliss, not a care in the world. 

3.  Nothing popped my bliss bubble back home in Kellogg. I was tired. My legs wanted rest. I wrote in my blog, enjoyed that Luna is becoming more and more animated after her dental surgery, nodded off, woke up, nodded off again, ate a couple of beef lunch meat sandwiches made between thin slices of Killer Dave's power seed bread, and crawled in bed early, fully ready to reap further rewards of hiking with a night of deep sleep.