Great Weekend

This has to have been one of the best Labor Day Weekends I have ever spent. On Friday I thought I was going to collapse from exhaustion and I felt overwhelmed at all the things I had to get done before we took off on Saturday. All I wanted to do was crawl into a hole and sleep all weekend.

However, Friday went better than I could have hoped. My mother-in-law spent the afternoon at my place happily looking after her grandson (our nephew) and with my two dogs and my sister-in-law's two dogs while my husband and his sister went golfing. I went off to Agility (dog class) at 6:30 and had a great class. We got back at around 8:30 and my husband had delayed dinner for my return even though I told him to go ahead without me. Anyway, he had gone out and got some great steaks and wine and by this time we were all pretty hungry (dogs too.) He made the entire dinner and my mother-in-law cleaned up. Neither my sister-in-law nor I had to do anything much except look decorative....(sort of).

The evening was pleasant and everyone stayed over until Saturday morning. We had a good visit and the in-laws cleared out Saturday morning.

So after they left, we got our gear together and headed down Highway 15 to New York State around noon. Since we anticpated a long wait at the border, we detoured and crossed at Hemmingford which turned out to be very pleasant and faster. Once in the U.S. we stayed on the secondary roads until Plattsburg whereupon we switched over to the I-State 87. As a side note, how many of you know that the original intention of the U.S. interstate road system was built as part of its overall defense strategy? If you look at where the roads are placed, they all go through towns and cities where there is/was a military presence. That has changed since the end of the Cold War. (But I digress).

Anyway, we drove down as far as Elizabethtown and headed toward Keene Valley. The plan was to back pack in 5 miles to the Giant Mountain Lean-To before dark. We started our hike at about 2:30 and after several water breaks and chit chats with other hikers, we reached the Lean-To at around 6 p.m, set up our tent and then we settled in for the evening. Dinner was a vegetarian Tandoori dish which was surprising good. It was dark by about 7:45 so we hung out and looked at the stars and turned in early.

The next morning we woke up earlyish, around 7:30, had breakfast (Mulligan stew) and set our sights on the big climb.We left all our gear at the Lean-To except for bringing along our day bags which had some food and water for the morning. Giant Mountain is well named as its peak is at 4600 feet and we had 2000 feet to climb in a space of 1.2 miles. Yes, it is quite strenuous and more so when you have to lift up two dogs (about 30 pounds each) one at a time on the steeper/higher faces. (The dogs loved it by the way.) We managed to reach the summit in 45 minutes whereupon we enjoyed a break and some energy bars. The view was fabulous and you couldn't even hear the highway.

We hung out, took a break and then went back down. The way back was a lot harder on the legs but we got back to our tent in about 40 minutes whereupon we collapsed and had a short snooze before packing up and heading back the way we had come the day before. We left around 1:00 p.m. and figured we would need at least 3 hours to walk out since we were carrying a lot of gear and it would therefore be as slow as the day before.

However, the hike out took us 2 hours and 57 minutes this time and at the end of it we were pretty tired. The dogs couldn't wait to get into the car and have a snooze. We, on the other hand couldn't wait to get to our motel that we'd booked to have a shower and a rest before dinner. The motel was in Wilmington, about a 20 minute drive away. Just as a note to other dog owners, Wilmington boasts a lot of motels (most in fact) that take pets no problem. The motel we stayed at was very nice, clean and quiet.

There is something very satisfying coming back into civilization after a trek like that. First there is no guilt about what and how much you eat. Second, it is a really satisfying experience because the tiredness you feel is "the good kind". Third, we treated ourselves to a nice dinner at a restaurant called the Hungry Trout and yes, that is the specialty. In fact the restaurant is right on a stream and they catch their own so it doesn't get much fresher. Ralph had smoked trout and I had the trout marnier (pan fried with orange sauce).

We staggered out of the restaurant and managed to drive back to our motel to collapse for the rest of the evening.

Yesterday we woke up around 8:30 feeling stiff and sore, so we compensated with a lovely leisurely breakfast of blueberry pancakes and sausages followed by a nice leisurely drive home.

My legs are still sore but all in all I am rested and feeling peppy.