Dawn and I hiked the Brown’s Ravine Trail Saturday. We normally head for distant trails — we particularly like the Tahoe Rim and the Pacific Rim — but decided on a whim to hike a trail in our own neighborhood, right up the street in fact. We’d planned only a short jaunt, just long enough to get acquainted with the trail, so we took too little water for what turned out to be a half day trek.

It was hot — really hot — by the time we reached the long levy we had to cross to return to our car and we’d been out of water for some time. At one point, I felt chills and told Dawn I thought I might be experiencing heat stroke. But we continued on, vowing never to do anything so stupid again.

On the good side, though, we learned that the trail is interesting and well marked. We stopped to photograph a great egret that posed willingly but remained just beyond the reach of my short lens. Despite the extreme afternoon heat, we enjoyed the hike and will definitely do it again… earlier in the day and packing a lot more water.