A Plan!

As many of you know, I live in New England but am originally from the Portland, Oregon.  I spend a lot of time longing for the tall, snow-capped mountains of the Pacific Northwest, but I'm stuck with these dinky little things instead.  Now, after 6 years of living here, I do finally like these dinky little hills for their own sake.  They have their own unique beauty, especially in the Fall, and the crunch of leaves under my feet as I walk through a deciduous forest brings back nostalgia for some wonderful hikes I've had on this coast.

That being said, the Appalachians...

(from Ismael Alonso's flickr)

...are not the Cascades.

(from Michael Lehenbauer's flickr)

In order to deal with this discrepancy, I have devised a cunning plan.  I shall take a small, well-hiked hill, Mount Monadnock:

(from Doug Kerr's flickr)

And then I will climb it in the winter!  And no, not like November or December.  It must be climbed in the January/February chills.

(from Tim D. at ecodiversity.com)

It's looking better already!

(from AMC Connecticut)

(from David Albeck)

I'm pretty excited.  This is one of the best hiking ideas I've had in a while.  Best part: as long as the weather's okay, you can get through this without much equipment.  I'll probably bring an ice axe and crampons, but that's mostly just so that I have an excuse to buy an ice axe and crampons.  You have to spend your REI dividend somewhere.

I've gotten a friend, Alex Khripin, to say he'd be up for climbing this in the winter.  See, Alex, now it's been published on a blog, it's official.

(By the way, go check out his blog at Unwholesome Foods.  It is fascinating and occasionally disgusting.)

After Monadnock in the winter, perhaps some winter camping is the next step?  Could I camp on a New England mountain in the winter?

(Monadnock photo, from Matthew Gemmell's flickr)

(And winter is coming.)

Obligatory New England Trip Report: Apple Picking

My parents visited me a couple weeks ago, and Mom and I did that New England thing and went apple picking.  Here are some pictures!

This is Mom:

And I have this apple on my head for some reason:

One of the issues with apple picking is that each year, you learn the names of all the apples and then you forget them by the next time October comes around.  If I write them here, then I can check next year.  This time, I learned that "empire" apples were the tasty ones, with "mutsu" apples coming in second.  Here I am with a tasty empire tree!

Empire apples are possibly the prettiest apples:

And they grow on trees, looking like big grapes!

There were so many apples that they were just lying everywhere in the paths:

Here's an especially pretty one.  It was especially tasty, as well:

That's about it for apple pictures, but here is a cloud.

 

Cheers from New England!