In Chicago we just had our first major snowfall of the season. We were predicted to receive 8-14 inches over about 24 hours, thankfully it was probably closer to 9. Don’t worry, they’re calling for more over the next couple of days. I worked from home on Friday, rather than clog the transit system with needless ridership, and CPS cancelled schools. Snow days are cool as an adult because everyone is forced to slow down a lot. Strangers help push stuck cars out of parking spots, drone photographers want you to know that the kids are sledding down the hill in Humboldt Park (good!) I grabbed my camera on my lunch break – and again after work – and sought to document the aftermath of the storm. During my lunch hour I walked to Armitage Produce, to pick up provisions so I could be successfully snowed in all weekend. After work, I had planned to walk from my apartment near Humboldt Boulevard to my dry cleaner’s on Western, pick up my dry cleaning, and take the bus back. When I got to the bus stop I had just missed the bus and another one wouldn’t be coming for another 20 minutes. It takes about 20 minutes to walk home from Western, so I wound up walking the whole way and back. Through that much snow, it really did feel like a hike.
Here’s the funny thing about walking down the sidewalk with 7-9 inches of fresh snow on them, it’s treacherous. Most people and businesses where I live in Logan Square are pretty good about keeping the sidewalks shoveled. The auto shop behind my house even contracts with a guy with a fourwheeler to clear the snow in the alley. But lots of sidewalks go unshoveled, whether because the property owners are jerks or too old or too sick, whatever. Curbs don’t drain sufficiently and dark, muddy puddles of mysterious depth are the greatest danger to dry feet out there. You’ve got to pay careful attention to your footing, it’s not fundamentally different than climbing up a rocky terrain (like in Devil’s Lake, Wisconsin!)
Urban hikes are different than nature hikes in obvious ways, but it’s foolish to discount one because it’s not natural or remote. True, the only wildlife you’re likely to see are pigeons, rats, other people, dogs and trains, but they’re wild and lively nonetheless. I like to think of the streetscape as exactly as worthy of discovery as natural landscapes. The Subway in Zion might be the hike of a lifetime (and it probably is) but every day the underside of the L tracks change every day, and every day I get to see those changes. I don’t think it’s a huge stretch to think of the Tastee Freeze as a destination hike in the same sense that Jackson Falls in the Shawnee Forest is a destination. They’re both beautiful, they both welcome everyone, and there is a time of the year when they are the more exciting to see, and a time of the year when they dry up. (Both are best in the spring.)
Urban hikes are great, you just have to learn to appreciate where you are and what’s going on.
