What once seemed like an impossible task is now more than halfway through. Twenty-five peaks down. I could probably finish the 46 High Peaks in another summer, if I really tried. In the High Peaks I always have a moment where I think I can’t do it, but don’t really have any choice. That’s what […]
They say we spend 90% of our lives inside. If that was converted to hours in a day it would mean we spend 21 hours and 36 minutes inside. Every single day. And only 2 hours and 24 minutes outside. And that, honestly… sounds about right. On this note though, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency […]
I! Am! Halfway! There! On Friday I hiked Cathedral Rock Fire Tower. 2.33 miles, 259 feet elevation gain. On Saturday I hiked Tabletop and Phelps. 13.15 miles, 3,855 feet elevation gain. On Sunday I hiked Wright, Algonquin and Iroquois. 11 miles, 4,386 feet elevation gain. On Monday I drove back home. 261 miles. A friend […]
Rainer Maria Rilke’s Poem says: You, sent out beyond your recall,go to the limits of your longing.Embody me. Flare up like a flameand make big shadows I can move in. Let everything happen to you: beauty and terror.Just keep going. No feeling is final. I was thinking about this poem a lot this weekend. I […]
We’ve been married 6 years. So I made him spend two days doing some things I love. In them I hope he understands all of this: “I want movement, not a calm course of existence. I want excitement and danger and the chance to sacrifice myself for my love. I feel in myself a superabundance […]
I have been adventuring hard, but not this weekend. This weekend I ran some errands, I had some quiet nights. I went to the drive-in. I watched Hallmark Movies with my mom. I went out for breakfast and watched a friend ride his bike by on a 60 mile “Tour de Keuka” fundraiser ride and […]
Sometimes you just know a thing will be perfect. Like driving to Indian Lake on a Thursday night after running a 5k in Dorchester Park and the sky is beautiful, and the roads are quiet. Like having climbing crags all to yourself, beautiful hikes, swimming holes, golden hour on an abandoned golf course, and enough […]
I’ve never been to Vermont. So we decided to go to Vermont. We stayed in an old farmhouse, we hiked, we climbed, we ate a lot of cheese. I thought about how regular life is so much lacking in these simple things that I wish I could have all of the time. Time outside, easy […]
Look, it’ll be a hard day. But not as hard as the day F. Peter Simmons had when he crashed his plane in the valley between Mount Marshall and Iroquois Mountain. I didn’t think it was too hard of a day, as far as High Peaks go, Mount Marshall didn’t feel too bad. Or maybe […]
Sometimes I don’t want things to start because I know that means they’ll end. Like weekends, like summer, like a beautiful climb, or a beautiful hike, or a beautiful day, or a delicious meal. As soon as something begins, you get that much closer to the end. I was thinking about this a lot on […]
