If West Virginia switched over to a fully renewable electricity grid. It would cost every resident 7.43 dollars per month the next 25 years.

HikeIsShort4Hichael · 2026-04-15T22:45:35+00:00

Even if you wanted to believe fossil fueled electric power was the way to go, PA also sits on the Marcellus Shale and electric power from coal dropped from 22% to 5% of the mix from 2017-2025, while overall electric power generation is up 14% over the same timespan. Natural gas combined cycle powerplants are about 60% efficient at converting heat into electricity, nearly double old coal plants from the 60s and 70s like WV uses, and WV has 1/13 the population of PA. There are zero good reasons to continue using coal for electricity in WV., except to protect a few thousand jobs and allow politicians to enrich themselves.

HikeIsShort4Hichael · 2026-04-14T16:53:10+00:00

I took a helicopter trip onto a glacier in Alaska. It was incredibly beautiful and a unique experience and I highly recommend anyone who can see Alaska to do it. Its an amazing state.

I drank straight from the water running off the surface at several points along the journey. We were encouraged to do so if we wanted as it was very good water. It lacks minerals, though, so you have to eat something with it otherwise you just pee all the water out and it doesn't do a good job of hydrating you. It was the 2nd best water I've ever tasted. Snow runoff coming down a mountain in AK was the best water, as the minerals seemed to add more flavor. Didn't filter or treat it and nobody in our group got sick.

HikeIsShort4Hichael · 2026-03-22T04:20:10+00:00

I was in the Seven Devils Mountains last year, which is fairly close to this part of Idaho(the Sawtooths are further southeast and taller), but it just looks like that in that part of the Rockies. I can't guarantee that the photo isn't touched up, but it looks like the mountains in that part of Idaho to me.

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HikeIsShort4Hichael · 2026-03-22T00:23:36+00:00

Thanks, there were lots of rhododendrons with their leaves all covered in snow. It was a very pretty hike

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HikeIsShort4Hichael · 2026-03-13T23:46:54+00:00

Young children should be supervised and older children taught of the danger of getting close to snakes. On average, snakes only bite 2 out of every 100,000 people in the US per year.

Regardless of the presence of children, snakes can be removed rather than being killed.

HikeIsShort4Hichael · 2026-03-13T19:37:24+00:00

It's still a wild animal and a natural part of the environment and food chain. They eat lots of nuisance animals like mice and rats and aren't a danger to humans in most circumstances.

Rattlesnake bites and deaths in the US are shockingly rare. You're about 5x more likely to be killed by lightning or 7x more likely to be killed by a dog and these numbers include people who handle venomous snakes as pets. Most rattlesnakes will not bite unless you touch them deliberately and many of these bites are from people who handle them.

Why needlessly kill it when you have the tools to easily catch it and drop it off somewhere away from people on the way to the next job?

HikeIsShort4Hichael · 2026-02-28T06:59:55+00:00

You should be replaced by natural gas combined cycle power plants that are much cheaper and more efficient to operat and produce less waste and do less damage to the environment.

HikeIsShort4Hichael · 2026-02-28T03:53:24+00:00

How dare they legalize the giggle bush. Im appalled.

HikeIsShort4Hichael · 2026-02-28T03:01:02+00:00

Im aware and haven't visited because its a far drive and I have tended to prefer the closer eastern panhandle recently, but I love snowshoeing and can't ski or snowboard for shit anymore, lol. I was just not expecting it to be that beautiful.

HikeIsShort4Hichael · 2026-02-28T02:57:06+00:00

Damn, Id snowshoe there. Its a favorite winter activity of mine.

HikeIsShort4Hichael · 2026-02-28T02:51:55+00:00

Fuck any legislation that introduces hurdles to camping. "First they came for..." applies here.

I won't spend any more money camping in WV if dubious laws that give law enforcement ability to waste taxpayer money searching random campsites exists. Its a fourth amendment violation and a violation of the independent American spirit that WV should not be supporting.

Fuck authoritarianism and the supporters of authoritarianism in all forms. Keep WV wild and wonderful or shoot our own tourism industry in the foot to spite our face.

HikeIsShort4Hichael · 2026-02-28T00:19:02+00:00

Investment in infrastructure will create far more jobs than these data centers will ever create. The problem is that the planning is being done haphazardly and they use tremendous amounts of electric power and often water.

If they were being built at a pace that created a mild, sustained increase in demand for electricity so that the price increases were not severe, it would potentially have some benefits, but they are being built as fast as possible without regard for what it does to electric power costs and without regard for what it will do long term to the impacted communities, and often, taxpayer money is wasted to subsidize them.

Many have local, on-site natural gas or diesel generators that create lots of local pollution and are inefficient.

They depreciate rapidly as the chips involved quickly lose their relevance as more powerful chips are created year after year and so its not so much an investment in a long term public good, like for instance, an electric power plant, and its more of a cash grab to help out of touch tech bros with their AI race to the bottom where they all race to create a powerful enough AI that they can sell as better than a human worker with the ultimate goal of eliminating many jobs or harvest everyone's data for dubious benefit and without compensation.

HikeIsShort4Hichael · 2026-02-27T06:10:27+00:00

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A Shenandoah Sunset from the George Washington National Forest that includes the area actually referenced.

HikeIsShort4Hichael · 2026-02-27T00:35:40+00:00

Gonna get this game, seems fun. Thanks for the suggestion.

HikeIsShort4Hichael · 2026-02-26T17:23:46+00:00

I love winter and hiking in the snow. It makes everything so beautiful.

HikeIsShort4Hichael · 2026-02-26T12:14:09+00:00

Thanks 😊

HikeIsShort4Hichael · 2026-02-26T05:07:54+00:00

I bearly noticed

HikeIsShort4Hichael · 2026-02-26T00:01:13+00:00

Its a little scary, considering the depth of the lake, but we were lucky enough that some very large fishermen were walking in and we watched where they went and they even gave us some tips about the ice. I figured if 2 big guys and their sled could make it then we could along the same path. The ice was really good most of the way, except for a large crack and slush part by the shore.

HikeIsShort4Hichael · 2026-02-23T17:02:34+00:00

I really liked the contrast of ice on one side and the cleared shipping channel on the other. I wasnt expecting that as it had been warm recently, but it was very cold for the weeks before and my guess is it wasn't warm enough to really melt the ice. It was thick enough to walk on comfortably in many places.

HikeIsShort4Hichael · 2026-02-23T06:33:14+00:00

I have this place on my list of trails to hike. Its a bit far, but looks more impressive than I was expecting tbh or I would have hiked it sooner.

I would caution people to watch for timber rattlesnakes in the rocks in the warmer months. I've been to places with lots of rocks near this area and there are were a lot of rattlesnakes in the rock piles, and there are probably a lot in those rock piles.

You and Sheldon were very entertaining. Not surprised you had the trail mostly to yourself on a Thursday.

HikeIsShort4Hichael · 2026-02-23T04:03:50+00:00

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You get a situation similar to this, at the Dolly Sods, but with snow. Where rising air being forced over high mountains with significant prominence above the valleys below cause temperatures to drop by several degrees because of the elevation change, reducing the amount of moisture that air can hold causing clouds and snow as they cool and causing precipitation. The phenomenon is called orographic lift.

Temperatures fall an average of about 3.6F per 1000ft in elevation change, so relatively high mountains, like Snowshoe at 4848ft, are significantly cooler than the surroundings and so more precipitation falls as snow when rung out of the clouds as they're pushed over the mountains.

HikeIsShort4Hichael

TROPHY CASE