This story is about the great adventure Pete and I took on Sunday morning.

It snowed a bunch overnight Saturday, and one of my favorite things to do on a snowy morning (despite my hatred of cold) is bundle up and go for a walk. Ideally with my camera in one hand and a hot beverage in the other. Sometimes I’m up early and I go out without him, but Sunday we headed out together along the bike path, which runs along the Neposet River to Dorchester Bay, for those not familiar with it. That will be important in a minute. We’re plodding along the bike path with our coffee (him) and tea (me) in travel mugs, me stopping to take photos every once in a while, and as we pass under the trolley tracks and come up on the marshes and I point out how high the water is. Pete points out that it looks like they started plowing the path but stopped halfway to where we were at. We keep walking, I keep taking pictures.

We get closer to where they stopped plowing, and realize that they didn’t plow…the path was flooded. But it doesn’t look that deep and we’ve both got boots on so we plod on through the few inches of water. That turn into 4 inches. And it’s cold water. That turns into 6 inches of freezing water. And at that point, you’re about 40 feet through it and you realize it’s the same distance forward or backward, so you might as well keep going forward. In the freezing water. That is not up to the top of your boots. And is seeping in through the zipper anyway.

I got out of that water and had to take my boots off and dump the water out. I also smelled like a swamp. And thought that if we didn’t get home (via the streets, NOT back through the water) STAT one of us would lose a toe to frostbite or die of hypothermia. Lucky for us, once we started moving our feet warmed up again very quickly. We squished our way home, quickly stripped off the boots, socks, and pants, and both felt fine within minutes.

Our boots, however? Still soaked, and we’re currently working on drying them out by stuffing them with newspapers and switching them out every few hours. My boots still reek of swamp, so hopefully some of the “odorz out” that we bought to help combat the litter box will help.

Anyone else have a great adventure this weekend?!