Partially inspired by my recent trip to Mt. Washington, Mike tossed around the idea of doing a weekend hiking trip. Having no plans other than hosting a halloween party friday and antsy to leave the city for a while - I signed on to the plan pretty quickly. After debating the logistics of a trip to the Catskills or the Adirondacks further upstate, we chose the former. It meant only staying over one night, no time off work, and a quick 90 mile drive to and from the Catskills.
I picked the rental car up around 10am Saturday, drove up to Fort Washington to pick up Mike - and we headed north on I-87. Shortly after crossing the Tappan Zee Bridge we detoured to the Eastern Mountain Sports in Nanuet. I needed a new pair of hiking shoes to replace the ones I destroyed on Mt. Washington two weeks ago. We continued up I-87 to the exit for Rt. 28, which would lead us directly into the Catskills.
While it was past peak-leaf season, there was still plenty of color left on the hills and mountains. The last remanants of orange and red were intersperced with patches of evergreen, bright yellows and bare branches. Not quite as stellar as New Hampshire two weeks prior, but a heckuva lot better than the forest of concrete I call home. We were both getting hungry - so we decided to find a local place to grab some lunch. We first stopped at this odd Caviar store, whose promises of "gourmet food" left much to be desired. The store did feature some pretty large, impressive wooden dioramas of caviar harvesting. According to the owner, they help to sell the caviar.
A bit further down the street we stopped at Bistro-To-Go, a good bet because there were a bunch of cars parked around it. Inside was a hip little bistro with a friendly staff filled with some good smelling food, which turned out to be just as tasty as it smelled! We continued on the road another couple of miles until we got to Boiceville. Here, our attention was peeled from the open road by an alien space shuttle, and tons of spacecraft off the side of the road. We agreed we had to stop and check this out, so I turned the car around and we walked around in awe of the sculptures of artist Steve Heller. He makes his sculptures out of scrap metal, old car parts, and plenty of woodwork. He even created a replica Stargate out of car parts!
We realized that since it was still pretty early, and it was such a nice day - we should do a quick little day hike to explore the area. We found the Fox Hollow Trailhead, and explored along a fun little steam, full of boulders and fallen trees.
A little ways up Route 28 we came to the small town of Pine Hill, NY. A very small "town", there was nothing of interest until we came to our resting place: The Colonial. Words can't truly capture how...strange the place was. Thankfully Mike takes a ton of pictures:
Mike's Colonial Inn Photo Gallery
The place had a feel like a packrat's heaven - tons of mismatched furniture, hunting paraphernalia on the walls, hunting targets on top of firewood, jukebox on the front porch, and even a random stuffed Mickey chilling out at the bar:
While the locals were certainly interesting, we were welcomed and made to feel as comfortable as you could feel with all the animal heads mounted on the wall. We partook of the "grand buffet", which was actually much better than we thought it would be. That's a good thing considering we almost lost our appetite looking at our waitresses teeth. Her mouth looked like black bean soup...but I bet the nearest dentist is a long drive away and she probably doesn't get dental when they're charging only $14 for an all you can eat buffet.
We spent the rest of the night going on a drive for provisions for the hike, packing our bags and hitting the hay. We got up around 4am, and made the short drive to our trailhead. We set off about a quarter after 5am - ready to reach the top of the first peak, Wittenberg Mtn.
For the sake of brevity I've decided I will leave out the details about the hike itself - Mike's already done it really, really well anyway. So, I've decided to take a different tack...
I find myself in a much more awake and vibrant state when I'm in the nature. Perhaps its just so noticeable because I live in an enormous city, so when I go on a hike or climb it tends to be feel a lot like jumping into a pool of ice water. With every step, there a much greater sense of immediacy and interconnectedness. Throughout a hike the woods reveal themselves, and therefore do their part to reveal "me" to myself. My mind doesn't wander so much and a very true sense of peace settles over me.
There was definitely a sense of accomplishment in reaching the top of any mountain, or in finishing a particularly difficult hike (15 miles in 10 hours). But what really matters is the journey you take to get there - and I feel very lucky that I'm able to enjoy those journeys so much more now. When I sit on top of a mountain making peanut butter and honeycrisp apple sandwiches, I am completely comfortable with myself and my surroundings - I realize it's all a singular experience and it makes me a very happy man indeed.
Since pictures are worth thousands of words: Mike's Complete Hike Gallery
- Chris
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1 comment:
Well done. We need to go back; if not for the hiking - for the Grand Buffet. Why, I never experienced a buffet so grand!
Looking forward to more treks!
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