Presently the Northern Hemisphere is heading into the last half of winter weather. Although rare for me - I did have a couple chances to putter around a bit in the outdoors thanks to the combination of reasonably good weather (for winter - anyway) and a week's reprieve from work, generally known as a vacation. However snow still presents a big problem in getting too far out in the wilds. I did visit an old talc mine in central Berkshire County where access was actually helped by the cold weather. Since it is flooded, but mostly open to the surface, I was able to walk the ice into the old mine and through its connecting tunnel (following the vein of talc) on out to a large open pit quarry. Two days later I visited my primary ongoing project over in the Connecticut River Valley. These rock formations had not been visited since 2007 and everything was put on hold due to a lack of new information. One new picture ("Kendall's Recess") has come into my hands but access to these sites is very limited between remoteness and snow and ice. However, walking old woods roads, packed by snowmobiles, got me to the general vicinity. Then I made my way only to the beginning of one set of ledges (Victorian Age: "Home of the Rocks") but somewhat better luck at "The Rock Shelter". Here I got my first wintertime look at the Castle End the southern gateway to these cliffs. Farther on I made my way past Etta's Nook, Rock Bend, Kittie's Nook, Pulpit Rock (finally a definitive location from the antique photo), Titan's Quarry, Tripe Lichen Ledge, Grave's Nook, and Myra's Retreat untill I finally needed to stop by Willard's Point and the Twin Slabs. However, I plan to spend much time in the coming years to acquaint myself with all the sites written and photographed about some 140 years ago!