67 in 67, Hike #2: Mount Abraham

Hike #2: Mount Abraham

Elevation: 4,006 feet

Date: October 7, 2012

Location: Killington, VT

Distance: 6.2 miles

Time: 2:58 (28:43/mile)

This is better. It’s the day after hiking Killington, and the day has dawned sunny and glorious. We are soooo going downhill mountain biking today!  And… cue the sound of the needle running across the record (and then cue the sound of a generation asking what a record needle is). Day’s great, but the ground’s soaked. The Killington desk noted that they would run the lifts, but their tone of voice was a clear indicator that those waivers you sign might be more relevant.

So we geared up again and this time we headed for Mount Abraham. It wasn’t as close, so we had a chance to enjoy the drive through rustic Vermont during foliage season, past barns, farms, and mountains. I usually find myself wishing I could live in a place like this, but then reality intrudes and I realize there's no people because there's no economy. 

Two up, two down, two days.



We clearly weren’t the only ones with this idea. The parking lot at the base of Abraham was packed, and we had to park along the road and then work our way through the hordes until it thinned out a bit; past the families with little kids, elderly, those clearly not dressed for the occasion. You know, rookies and wannabes. Not me, nope. I’ve got gear! Camelbak = street cred. North Face boots mean I'm a lucky break away from being some survivalist with his own Discovery Channel show! Torn hiking pants mean this ain't my first rodeo! So after a bit, I got over my snobbery and Sara and Studley McHike-a-lot we were making decent time. Things were muddy and wet, and my bad knee was a bit balky, but the other muscles loosened up. I talked myself through my aches by alternating between challenging myself to not act old and using an inner voice of some grumpy grampa: "when I was a kid, we made a brace out of sticks and vines. And then we plowed 40 acres. And we liked it!" Sara, oblivious to my inner monologue, was having a great time.

She’s hiked for years and was clearly in her element. She knows her pace, which tends to be a bit slower than mine, and she’ll stay with it endlessly and rarely wears down. I’m more of a sprinter type, so I’ll be faster and then tire. She also enjoys the grind, even with a 35-pound pack, whereas I get bored. But I love tricky spots that I can make into a game. I once compared us to a pack mule and a quarter horse, one with great endurance and one better with speed. But somehow it didn't quite come across as the compliment it was, so I'll refer to her as my beautiful Sherpa now. Oh well, bottom line is that she’s experienced and usually confident. Me, sort of the opposite.



Fun times rock scrambling at Mount Abraham, VT.



We trudged on, me getting a bit bored with the endless Stairmaster. But near the top there was a rock scramble. Yay! This is better. It’s like a game, using more of your whole body as you look for your line and hoist yourself up. So I was grooving as we topped out on the summit.

We met Tim at the top, a caretaker who was wet, with cold, soaked shoes, yet who was still amicably chatting with hikers as they summitted. Tim was two days from finishing the season and heading back to Tennessee. Undoubtedly, he’d enjoy dry clothing and baseboard heating. But as someone who has returned in the past, his heart is clearly in Vermont.  



After a good conversation with Tim, we enjoyed being able to see New York in one direction and New Hampshire in the other. I digressed into a personally satisfying rant after seeing Lake Champlain. Great lake. But not a Great Lake. Seriously. Growing up, they were Huron, Ontario, Michigan, Eerie, and Superior: HOMES. That’s how I remembered them for the Social Studies test.  But now it’s, what, CHOMES? HOMECS? MOCHES? And you’ve got five adjoining lakes and then Champlain, the red-headed stepchild off on the right, just to drive revenue via federal legislation. Just doesn't seem right. Here comes Grampy Grumpy again: "when I was a kid we only had five great lakes. And they were adjoining. And we liked it! Baaaahhh!"

Rock Hopper and his favorite Sherpa in front of the allgedly Great Lake Champlain

Sara, practicing her "scooch" technique

After a couple more bah-humbugs, we descended. Going down the rock scramble required scooching on the bum at times. It’s not a technique one normally trains for. In fact, Microsoft tells me "scooch" isn't even a word, but I think we know better. I’ve had bum races with my daughters up and down the hallway at home, scooching rapidly to many victories. Apparently, I’ve got the lean (gangly) frame that allows me to excel at bum races and rock scramble descents. Which meant I cruised down it. Sara stuck with her slow-and-steady-wins-the-race approach. Once below that point, we started making pretty good time and decided we wanted to beat the book pace. I took a brief time-out to find a parallel with biking: when I bike over trees lying at an angle across the trail, especially if they’re wet, my back tire can fishtail and, as boxing commentator Howard Cosell famously said, “down goes Frasier! Down goes Frasier!” Well, as I was hopping and frolicking down the trail like some eight-year-old dosed up on Halloween candy, I landed on a log and found that boots can respond the same way. Luckily, virtually no one was there to see me fall, or pop back up looking around with a “nothing-to-see-here-ya-lookey-loos” expression. Only one person. Unfortunately, it was Sara, giggling at me since I was muddy but otherwise unscathed. I recalled my snootishness with the crowds as we began to hike and my guess is many of them didn't take diggers. We realized we could have a sub-30-minute pace if we hustled. So I wiped the mud off my ego and my whole left side, and it ended with a near sprint back to the road. 28:43 pace per mile over the 6.2 total distance. Nice!

That night, we had hard-to-find Switchback drafts and a gourmet pizza at the Outback Pizza & Nightclub. The place looked like it was some converted maple sugar shack deep in the mountains, and had a wood-fired stove for pizzas and a huge fireplace in the middle of the room. We warmed up at a pub table by the fire, listened to some guy doing great covers with his own personal twist, and wished we had more time here. It’s a bummer that I’ve started this adventure but can only get a couple of hikes along before winter settles in. I guess the good news is that I love skiing, and at least I’ve got more than a lone summit to my name, but maybe by the time Spring rolls around I’ll be jonesing for more summits.



Part of the premise of this whole thing involved feeling like I’ll never retire early and spend decades farting around, doing whatever my li’l heart desires. I'm definitely not the only one in that boat, and it's not my style to whine. So my challenge is to figure out what I’d do if I did retire, and how I can weave those activities more heavily into my current life. This adventure allows me to be outdoors, travel New England a bit, bond with Sara and others, and do some writing. For her, with aspirations of through-hiking the Appalachian Trail, it’s like a training ground. In the meantime, I can settle into ski season and wait for the chance to pick back up with this next Spring.

See you on the trail,

Jay Bell, AKA Rock Hopper