Shenandoah Planning

In my late December hiking year in review, I said that we were going to try to plan a few long weekend getaways instead of one big hiking trip. We've talked about this a couple of times, and all agreed that we need to put something on our calendars as soon as possible - otherwise normal busyness will fill up every weekend, and our trips won't happen.

A flurry of e-mails went around in the past week, and I'm very happy to say that weekend getaway #1 is written in stone on the family calendar. Four of us will camp and hike in Shenandoah National Park the first weekend in April. We'll leave Thursday after work, get a motel room in the vicinity of the park - which will give us three full days of hiking and two nights of camping in SNP. We'll be home Sunday night, so we'll only have to take one vacation day.

I'm very excited. First of all, we're currently in the midst of the coldest weather in over 20 years, with daytime high temps in the single digits (F) - so it's nice to have thoughts of Spring and getting outside. Also, I simply adore Shenandoah N.P., and we've barely scratched the surface of the hiking trails there.

Eric refers to the many many weekend trips we made to SNP in the post-college years - and he's right, we drove down there many weekends. But none of those trips involved any serious hiking. We drove Skyline Drive, got out at the overlooks, and did the one-mile bunny trail to Stony Man Peak. They were wonderful trips - but they weren't hiking trips.

We *have* done a couple of hiking trips to SNP in the past decade - but we're in no danger of running out of new trails to hike in any of our lifetimes.

Darling Wife was quick to point out that early April could mean cold nights, rain, or both. She's right, of course, but that doesn't dim my excitement. We'll hope for the best, and bring gear to deal with whatever comes.

I can't wait.

Susquehanna S.P., 1/1/15

John and I talked over Christmas week about the possibility of a New Year's Day hike. That's something we've done before, and I always like when it works out. It's a nice feeling to be up and out early on New Year's Day when no one else is out, and it feels good to start the year active and outdoors.

We had both agreed that we were free and wanted to hike, and tossed around some ideas as to where we'd hike, when I texted Eric to see if he'd also be interested. He was both interested and available, so we just had to settle on the question of "where." One place John mentioned struck my fancy - Susquehanna State Park, on the Maryland side of the river, and just off of I-95. I'd never been there, and it looked to be about an hour away (i.e., not *too* far), and I like hikes that go along the shore of a body of water.

250+ year-old oak tree

The map on the park website showed a number of trails which could be made into a loop of 6-8 miles. I suggested it to the guys, and no one had any objections, so that became our plan.

We met at Eric's at 9:30am on a bright, sunny, and very cold morning. Perfect hiking weather. I had a few light layers with me, but I knew that I'd be plenty warm once I got moving on the trail. We found the park and the trailhead with no trouble.

We hiked north along the banks of the river. The water views were beautiful, and Conowingo Dam was visible in the distance. We'd been going for a while when someone (I don't remember who, just that it wasn't me) realized that we'd missed a turn we intended. We were off the state park loop and on a trail that would take us all the way up to the dam. We backtracked, found our turn, and continued on our intended route.

Stream crossing

We made a big counterclockwise loop, with a bit of up and down - though nothing overly punishing. We got back to the car, and my GPS track had us at about 6.8 miles. I decided that it should be a 7-mile day, and hiked a tenth of a mile south up the river bank. Silly, I know. :-)

Beautiful day, great hike, great companions, great start to 2015.

(Brother Eric's take on the day, with pics, is here.)

Distance: 7.07 miles
Elapsed Time: 3:20

Hiking Year in Review

I just took a look at my hiking year in review from one year ago, and I'm struck by how similar this year was to last. I simply didn't do a lot of hiking. There weren't any impromptu "take a day off and go" days, and no "get up at dawn on a Sunday and drive to a day-hike" days. I didn't do a fall day at Hawk Mountain Sanctuary either last year or this. That's not a problem, it's just a change from years past when I did that fairly frequently.

There are a number of reasons, some motivational, some logistical. I enjoy hiking and the outdoors as much as ever.

There were two main highlights this year:

• Our boys' West Virginia weekend. Since we couldn't do a big trip this year, we did long weekend at Seneca Rocks and the Dolly Sods wilderness area. We left on a Friday night and got back late Monday - so we had 2 1/2 days away for the price of one vacation day. The hiking, the scenery, and the camaraderie were fantastic.
• The overnight trip in April with Eric and John to Ricketts Glen State Park. The Falls Trail at Ricketts Glen has been on our lists for years, and it was great to finally hike it. It has a reputation as a "bucket list" hike, and it lived up to its reputation. The Sunday drive up to the area with Eric was also a lot of fun - we meandered around the countryside in search of geocaches and pretty scenery.

Our intention for 2015 is for more trips like the West Virginia weekend. A few of us have life commitments that will make a big trip impossible again - but the three- or four-day weekends are very possible. There are countless great hikes in a 3-5 hour driving range, and we just have to get some weekends on our calendars. If we don't, the calendar will fill up, and it won't happen.

We need to make it happen. That's my resolution for the New Year.

Marsh Creek S.P., 12/27/14

John told me about hiking plans he and a few buddies had for the Saturday after Christmas - a day trip to one of my favorite place, Harper's Ferry, WV. That's a long day trip, with 3+ hours of driving each way, but there's so much great hiking and scenery there. I was enthusiastically in.

Unfortunately, I felt very unwell Friday night, had a terrible night's sleep, and was unable to answer the bell on Saturday morning. Very disappointing. But I slept all morning and felt a good bit better by noon. It was a beautiful warm sunny day, so I looked for a nearby place to get outside - and settled on Marsh Creek State Park.

I parked at the west-side boat launch, and took the trail that follows the lake, crosses the dam, and continues on the east side. The trail was a muddy quagmire in many spots, but it felt great to be outside and on a trail.

Total distance: 5.50 miles
Elapsed time: 1:42

Inside the Tracker's Pack

Interesting article: Inside the Tracker's Pack

There's no getting around it - this hasn't been a particularly good year for me hiking and getting outdoors. But I'll save my year-in-review post for the end of the year. And it's possible that with a few days off over the holidays, I'll finish the year with an actual hike.

Stay tuned.

Thru-hiking the A.T.

A friend of mine has a 20-something daughter who completed a thru-hike of the Appalachian Trail this past fall. We recently had dinner with the friend and his wife, and I peppered him with questions about the daughter's hike.

Backing up a bit, the Appalachian Trail is a hiking trail that goes from Springer Mountain, GA to Mt. Katahdin, ME - more than 2,100 miles along the crest of the Appalachians. Thru-hiking the trail means completing it in one year, which normally means starting in Georgia in the early spring and finishing in Maine by middle October (Baxter State Park in ME, where Mt. Katahdin is located, is closed for the winter on the first heavy snowfall, which is usually in mid-October.)

The upshot of our dinner conversation was that his daughter and her friend did great and had a wonderful time. A local newspaper did a feature on them, here.

The A.T. runs through PA, and its closest point to me is above Reading at Port Clinton - a little more than an hour's drive. I've probably day-hiked the majority of the PA trail between the Susquehanna and the Delaware River, and John and I did a memorable two-day backpack from Delaware Water Gap to Wind Gap in 2009 as training for our Grand Canyon backpack. (I posted trip reports from Day 1, Overnight, and Day 2.)

I've been asked, and have also asked myself, if I'd ever want to thru-hike the A.T. I can't say it's a burning desire. First of all, it's unrealistic. I can't just take six months off and hit the trail. And every time I've seen and talked to thru-hikers, they tend to be either recent college grads (i.e., haven't started "real life" yet and have no responsibilities) or early retirees (50's or 60's and reached a point in life where the kids are grown and they actually can take some time off.)

But even if you disregard that, I'm still not sure I want to. Everything I've heard is that a thru-hike is more a mental endurance test than a physical test. When it's poured rain for a week straight, and everything you're carrying is soaking wet, how badly do you want to continue? So I can't say that's a goal of mine - though hiking buddy Ted has stated numerous times that I will be joining him on a thru-hike one day. So we'll see.

One thing I definitely intend to do is to do more section hiking on the A.T. It runs the length of Shenandoa National Park, and I've only done a few miles of that. And it runs through Maryland near its narrowest point - just 24 miles. That would be a fun 3-day backpack to complete the A.T. in one state. I'd also like to complete the trial between the Susquehanna and the Delaware. These seem like much more realistic goals.

Survival TV

I stumbled on this article about "survival TV" and Cody Lundin, and it's worth a read.

I have a weak spot for survival TV and have watched a bit over the years. My first exposure was Les Stroud and Survivorman, and I still prefer Les to anyone else. I was traveling and alone in a hotel room one night when I stumbled on a Survivorman marathon, and spent the rest of the evening entranced.

I got my whole family interested in Survivorman, and my girls particularly liked watching episodes with me. A DVD of a Survivorman season was usually one of my Christmas gifts in those years.

I've seen Cody Lundin on survival shows, and I like him and think he's the real deal. I also think his book is a must-read for anyone who spends time outdoors (reviewed by me, here.)

As survival shows got more popular, there had to be more "action", and became more wilderness stunts, and less survival (which is the point of the Cody Lundin article at the top.)

I found a new show a few weeks ago, Fat Guys in the Woods, while recovering from an unsuccessful attempt to cut off my thumb. I got sucked in, watched a few episodes, and it wasn't bad. A survival guy takes three fat, out-of-shape guys who have no exposure to the outdoors out into the woods for a week and teaches them how to survive.

I liked it with some caveats. I think they were being given food off-camera. You can't convince me that obese couch potatoes who have eaten little or nothing for 3-4 days (which is what the episodes depicted) wouldn't be moaning *constantly* about how hungry they are. But they weren't.

I'll be happy to watch it - at least until Les Stroud comes out with some new Survivorman eipsodes.