Knowing it was milder today than yesterday, above freezing, with full sun exposure and a brisk breeze, we anticipated that the trails leading through the forest in the ravine wouldn't be quite as icy and slippery as they were yesterday. We managed just fine yesterday, thanks to our strap-over-boots cleat sets, but we took our time and were wary of slips.

Jackie and Jillie manage just fine without their little rubber boots now that the weather is not as icily inclement as it has been for much of the winter. Where the sun hits the trails the icy surface has turned slightly mushy. Mushy, actually, is the order of the day everywhere now that we're experiencing afternoons above freezing.

The top layer of snow has melted, washing down the hillsides into the creek, leaving behind interior layers that the warmer temperatures are turning to slush. Where the slush has melted, it has revealed the inner core of ice covering the trails. There, we tread gingerly, depending on our cleats to get us downhill and uphill safely.

I'm still in recovery mode with my right arm, from an ascent-slip on an autumn rain-wet narrow trail. It's taken me months of self-rehabilitation, for fuller use of my shoulder and arm without pain. So I do take extra care, not wanting to end up with a re-injury of an arm that through the years had been battered and beaten quite enough.

Many others in the wider community had the same goal as we did, to get out into the forest and enjoy the spring-like atmosphere, so we came across a wide variety of dogs, large and small, most of which were familiar to Jackie and Jillie. Everyone is appreciative of the wonderful recreational resource the forest's proximity to the community affords its residents. We must have seen at least ten people out and about today with their companion dogs.

One couple we've known for years informed us that they had just returned from a trip to Florida. We stood together and chatted awhile. And when we parted I did a mental double-think, that it would have been better had we stood further apart, taking greater care to separate ourselves from them, since they had just returned from a state that is beginning to experience quite a number of coronavirus cases.

Then another couple, both retired dentists with their own business they sold on retirement had returned from overwintering in Mexico where they had bought a property. With them were their two dogs, left behind with their son and his girlfriend, who live with them in the near neighbourhood. At least they returned from sunny Mexico to sunny Ottawa, albeit still in its winter throes. Mexico's infection rate remains low, as yet.

It was that kind of day, a day of double-think, given the startling and unnerving news of COVID-19 infections that have been cropping up everywhere, and the actions taken to control and manage the situation. Just today it was announced that all publicly funded schools in Ontario will be closing, and all manner of conventions and public popular entertainment and sport events have been cancelled.

And then, a moment's inattention, trying to hold Jackie's leash in one hand, my camera in the other, concentrating on capturing a scene while negotiating an icy stretch of trail, despite my cleats I slipped and fell. Hard ice doesn't much cushion a fall. Fortunately my fall didn't involve my arm. I fell on my right hip, and it hurt like the devil once I got up, but that didn't last long. We soon continued on our way, and I was able to walk with ease.

Back home, nothing felt out of the ordinary, no aching hip, nothing, though in all likelihood if I'd sustained a bruise, it might be sore for a week or so. The puppies engaged in their usual boxing-match-and-chase once back in the house, and waited patiently for my husband to haul the cauliflower out of the crisper in the refrigerator and cut off nice round chunks of florets for them.