Lewis Trail after Storm Damage, June 3, 2013

Heard this weekend that the weather on Monday was going to be unseasonably cool, so I postponed a lunch engagement to hike. Slept in a little, knowing that the weather would remain around 70 degrees all day.  Was a little rueful that I didn't get up sooner--and that I had made plans to go to Shakespeare in the Park at 6:30 because it would have been a perfect day for a hike at Hawn or one of the trails farther away from St. Louis that I haven't visited in awhile.  But. . .thankful for the day, I set out to stop by my Dad's to drop off some photos and then settled for the Lewis and Clark Trail, planning to try to get in 8 miles. . . .

Started to take the usual photos. O.k., here's some purple ivy, thinking that this would be a hike where everything was as usual. . . . .

Then I started to see storm damage.  Major storm damage from Friday's tornadoes, which were said to be EF3's.

 I admit that I was interested. Did the tornado actually hit the trail? Or did just very high winds do this?  At first, I thought, there will just be a small swath, but I kept passing more downed trees across the trail.

 Limbs cracked in half. . .

 This one, I had to crawl under.  The very first half mile of the trail, which usually takes ten minutes to traverse, had become an obstacle course. See all of the photos below:

Snapped in half. . . .

 After the first vista, I came across a large downed tree, on the part of the trail that descends before a long incline leading to the second vista.  The trail leads downhill, but is also on a down hill slope, so the tree was crossing the trail downhill.  I tested it for security and then climbed through the branches to get to the other side, thinking, "Oh well, I won't have to climb back over it. . . ."

 Second vista shows how high the river is. . . .

 Even more downed trees, but then I ran into another hiker. Young guy, bearded with a hiking stick, who tells me that the trail is impassable at the creek. I decide to hike down there, check it out anyway, thinking I might be able to take off my boots and cross. . . . .

Not so. Not so at all.  The river has risen so high that stagnant water has obliterated the creek. The trail ends abruptly (above) and and you can't even see where it picks up again. All is swamp. This meant I'd be turning around and hiking back out, for a total of about 5 miles. Around this time, Dad calls to ask if I've been in the house (who else would print off pics of Memorial Day at Pat's and leave them, framed, on his counter top?) I tell him about the storm damage and the flooding, send him a pic. If I'd had more time, I would have hiked in the opposite way to see where the flooding ended on the other side of the trail--and also to check out more damage.  Amazingly, although many homes were destroyed, there were no injuries during Friday's tonrados.