3 MONTHS OUT

As of yesterday, it's already been three months since I finished my Appalachian Trail thru-hike. Life off the trail has been great, but I still miss the trail and thru-hiker life so much every day. A fellow thru-hiker recently made this video and it does an incredible job describing some of the post-trail emotions I've felt.

On another note, the pictures above are a few favorites I took on trail. If you'd like to see some more trail pictures, I posted at least one picture for every day of my trip on Instagram. The blog Appalachian Trials also posts amazing hiker-sourced pictures to their Instagram account year-round. Just look through some of those and tell me that you're not starting to think of thru-hiking!!

My Next Adventure...

If you follow along, you probably know that I really like hiking. You already maybe already read it here, but I'm now saying it freaking out about it officially:

I'm going to thru-hike the Applachian Trail.

(And I'm planning to start fifty days from today!)

More on this to come. I've been dreaming of this since high school.
I can't believe it's finally going to happen.  

Saturday In The Steinhardt Gardens

This weekend was the weekend that I finally went home to get my winter coat. Not my computer which is still apparently its own messy saga, but I got my winter coat!


While I was in Westchester, I ended up catching Amies AB and S and we spent Halloween morning at the Steinhardt Gardens in Bedford.


Amie AB has been talking up going to these gardens all autumn, so I'm glad we had the chance to go last weekend as they are privately owned and only open twice a year - once in the spring and once in the autumn. They sprawl out on almost 60 acres and feature a Japanese garden, tons of exotic animals, and loads of flowers, ponds, trees, and sculptures.


I really wasn't kidding about the exotic animals part. We parked right where the camels and zebras were.


Seeing these in Westchester is quite the weirdest!


And calls for a selfie where possible. (Also, this may be the reason I am considered an awkward kid by some ;) ).



Then we walked up into the Japanese gardens, which were easily our favorite part.




The Japanese maples were in full color and there were exotic birds galore.


Amie S even fell in love with one of the maples.

Or maybe two.


Or maybe all of them. And she picked an entire bouquet of leaves to bring home!


We finally got pushed on our merry way towards the other gardens when we got chased away by some aggressive geese.


After making our way through the other autumnal themed gardens and back to where we left the car, we drove up further north to Salinger's Orchard where we picked up donuts and apples.

These were gone in just about five minutes and a sweet end to an autumn morning indeed.

September Hiking In The Adirondacks

Because I didn't share this already (or like anything for the past month since my computer broke) below are some hiking adventures from September when my mom and I went up to the Adirondacks for a mother-daughter hiking weekend just like last year.

Our day began bright and early.

The first mountain we summited, Marble Mountain, wasn't a high peak, but we made it to the top by 8:30, which is always a good way to start a morning. 

Shortly after Marble, we came to a fork in the trail. One way was to Esther. The other to Whiteface.

We hiked Esther first. 

It took us 1.5 hours roundtrip, but was surprisingly easy as far as Adirondack High Peaks go.

We then came back to the fork in the trail and headed up Whiteface. Whiteface is where the 1932 and 1980 Olympics took place, and a mountain I ski every few years. Having skied there before, it was so weird to stumble upon the chairlifts (and sit on them!) without any snow below. 

Just around noon we made it to the summit of Whiteface.

And got some beautiful views of Lake Placid. I haven't been to the town of Lake Placid since I was much younger, but I'd never seen it at a height. Whoa. 

Funny story about that building... We walked in and it had some benches and an elevator. We walked around looking at the maps on the wall and suddenly the elevator opened. I was like, "Let's get on Mom!" I thought it went up to the weather station. But no. 

It started going down and the elevator operator was like... well you're on a ride 300 feet down into the mountain. We got out and were greeted by a dark tunnel and found ourself exiting into the parking lot where tourists who drive up the mountain park. 

After taking in all the sights, we hiked down. And a little more than 13 rugged miles, it was a great day. We went out for burgers and then went home to nap... for 11 hours.