On Tuesday, Josh took off work, the sweetie that he is, so we could go on an adventure. We decided on an afternoon hike at Parfrey's Glen, or Parfley's Glen according to Josh. Located about 5 miles from Devil's Lake State Park, it took us less than an hour to get there. The parking area and the start of the trail were a little hard to find, so of course we got lost, but we got to check out the town of Merrimac, upon which we discovered where the rich people that work in Madison are able to own sweet houses with a lake view.
Parfrey's Glen has an easy walking trail that follows a stream tumbling over rocks down the glen. I guess the area flooded pretty badly in 2008 and was closed to the public for a while. We're glad to see it back open, because it was fantastic. You literally follow the stream the entire length of the trail until you reach a point where the water and rocks prevent much of a foot trail. At one point, we reached the "end" of the marked trail (maybe because of flood damage?), and we continued to hike and climb our way as far as we could go along the glen. As we started to move into restricted territory, we ran into a man coming in our direction carrying what turned out to be some drawings. His name was Steve Hovel and he has been working on a series of drawings that he is getting ready to publish soon. Check out his website http://www.shovelartpress.com/ to see his stuff! After we parted ways, Josh and I kept hiking and climbing up, over, and around rocks until we reached a point where we could go no further. This was by far the coolest part of the hike. We saw the greatest rock formations and scenery at this point and were thoroughly impressed. Parfrey's is definitely a place we will check out in the summer. Go to this link to see the rest of the photos from our adventure.
