Conditions in the lower valley have dried out and those routes can now be hiked, but many of the hills surrounding the valley are still muddy or icy.    The exceptions are the Batchelor Range and the Dewdrop Range.    Those areas are south-facing and open to accelerated drying from the sun, warm conditions, and warmer winds.    The Dewdrop Range is a benchland with rocky bluffs overlooking Kamloops Lake, and the steep rocky Red Plateau Escarpment above.   Much of the Dewdrop Range is open sagebrush grassland with open pine trees in protected areas.   A few gullies and north slopes have more trees, but on the whole it is open enough to be fine for hiking by mid-March (later for Red Plateau).    A few days earlier the road to the Battle Bluff Trailhead was mostly dry, but on this morning, there was a couple of centimeters of new snow on the range.    We drove along the Frederick Road to our trailhead (at N50 45.163 W120 36.576).

We hiked down the Frederick Road into a gully, then heading west to our turn.

We turned up a rough double track (at N50 45.247 120 37.296) which climbed the hills and then became a grassy track along the benchlands.

We turned right and came back on double tracks which were becoming muddy, making turns to complete a 7.3 km (1.8 hr) hike in the Outer Dewdrop Range.

There are many possible routes in the Dewdrop Range to hike, bike, or explore.   It will be busier on those routes as the season warms up and trails and roads dry up.