Weekend One

Of course it is of no use to direct our steps into the wood, if they do not carry us thither.  I am alarmed when it happens that I have walked a mile into the woods bodily, without getting there in spirit…What business have I in the woods, if I am thinking of something out of the woods? ~ Thoreau [Walking]

Today was the first weekend of my ‘training’ for the big climb.  I wanted to go on a longer loop but the weather didn’t cooperate.  I’ve been on the top of Aaron’s Ledge in the middle of a thunderstorm and it’s not fun.  I cut it down to 2 hours and 5.6 miles.  It’s the normal “long loop” that Erin and I take.  I had planned on taking a right and heading up to AL then around the rest of the mountain, down by Erin’s house and back home.  I’m figuring it would have taken an extra hour. Maybe next weekend. I’ll have an extra day with the holiday!

I did learn a few things though:

1. This is my first time with a pack and it was fine.  It fits perfectly. However, I need to keep working on my shoulders–I found my neck was getting a little tired from the extra weight.  Nothing major.
2. I prefer my Nalgene bottles over my camelbacks with the sipper.  And it’s hard to get the waterbottle out of the backpack…
3. Need to take more pictures 🙂
4. Need to work on stretching my back more…my lower back gets sore very quickly.  Yoga…yes.
5. I don’t like my socks 😦  I gave in and washed my favorite ones…they were still in the drier when I left.  Wore a different pair and they aren’t as comfy.  My toe hurt after a little while.
6. BUG DOPE…never leave home without it!
7. I really, really love it out there!! But sometimes I forget to look around me and enjoy the journey…

 

Tomorrow is kayaking…

Transcendental Saunterer

HD Thoreau once said of walking, ‘No wealth can buy the requisite leisure, freedom, and independece which are the capital in this profession. It comes only by the grace of God. It requires a direct dispensation from Heaven to become a walker. You must be born into the family of the Walkers.’ ~ Walking, HD Thoreau

Jack Orrok in 1923

I think there might be some truth there.  Either you love it, or you don’t.  Either you yearn to be outside in the widerness, walking-sauntering-through the peaceful land, or you don’t.  But, then again, his grandmother WAS an Orrok after all.  Perhaps it runs in our blood.  My grandfather, Jack Orrok, was an avid hiker.  He left home every summer, traveling from Dorchester, MA to the White Mountains of NH, to work on the trails.  He was born into the family; or perhaps it was just passed down to him…then me.

I’m planning my first hiking trip up Mount Washington [yes, first but not last!].  Twelve weeks from today I’ll be heading back down the mountain, my back aching, my legs sore, my heart full and my soul soaring!  I’d love to say that this has been a life-long dream, but I’d be lying.  But it has been a dream since hitting 40 🙂 

So, as I count down the days and get myself in shape I’m hoping to share even more of my favorite moments with you all!

The chivalric and heroic spirit which once belonged to the Rider seems now to reside in, or perchance to have subsided into, the Walker–not the Knight, but the Walker, Errant.  He is a sort of fourth estate, outside the Church and State and People.  ~ Thoreau