Candy Mountain Contrasting Hikes 3 days, 3 different hikes

The snow we had when we woke up on Sunday morning was calling me to one of my local mountains for a hike.  I chose Candy Mountain because it is closer to my home than other trails.  I really wanted to hike in the snow, especially since it was only a couple of inches deep.

It was a beautiful morning to hike on Candy Mountain.  I took the usual trail after going up the service road to the edge of the fence.  Make sure you check out the Candy Mountain Hike page for details on directions, maps, and description of this hike and more than 40 other hikes around our area!

I did record an episode of the Hike Healthy Podcast during my snowy hike.  The topic is Talents or gifts or abilities, which we all have the blessing of having to one degree or another.  You can click on this link and you will be directed to this episode of the Hike Healthy Podcast which should be published by January 9.

Since the snow was fresh and fairly powdery, it wasn’t too slick.  I did wear my hiking boots, which gave me good traction.  The wind was calm and it was a very peaceful hike, it was a beautiful morning so I decided to go up on Monday morning and what a contrast!

Monday morning, my wife and I had a restless night of sleep because the wind was howling outside our West Richland home.  I decided it might be interesting to climb Candy Mountain again!  What a contrast from Sunday morning!  There were hurricane strength winds on top of Candy Mountain!  I told my wife I need to get a velocometer (I don’t even know if thats a word but I would like to know how hard that wind was blowing!).  You can see my headphone wires blowing in the wind.  The temperature swing was huge, too.  It was in the low 50’s on Monday and there was no sign of the previous morning’s snow.

 

Well, if two days in a row are good, how about going for three?  I decided to hit Candy Mountain again on Tuesday morning and it was a much nicer hike.  It was a little chilly at about 35 degrees but the winds were again calm.  I got several nice pictures and even did a GoPro video panorama from the top (with a cameo of myself spinning around at the end, you can watch the video below).

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As you watch the panorama video, pick out the landmarks: Red Mountain, Badger Mountain, Goose Hill, Rattlesnake Mountain, McBee Hill and the Horse Heaven Hills, The Columbia River with the White Bluffs, Jump-off Joe, Johnson Butte and so on. I took the panorama below looking south on Candy Mountain, it shows a good view of Badger Canyon, I-82, and the I-82/I-182 interchange.  This was such a nice day that I took a loop I had not taken below.  I included a GPS tracing on a Google Earth image to show my route on the Tuesday hike.