This past Saturday Boyfriend and I decided to head up to southwestern New Hampshire and climb Mount Monadnock. You know when you think of an idea in your head and it sounds
so good then you actually do it and wonder,
"What was I thinking?!" Yeah, hiking was just like that.
The weather was perfect - 74 degrees, sunny and pleasant with just a hint of fall in the air. We packed up some water bottles, put our hiking outfits on (mine was totally not cute, but I was hiking so it's okay. I mean I tried to glam it up but Boyfriend told me rhinestone covered sunglasses are not hiking appropriate), and drove two hours north.
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| in the car heading to the mountain. boyfriend said my ray bans were appropriate to hike in. |
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The ride up was lovely, and once we were close enough I managed to snap a picture of the peak.
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| getting ready to start our hike! you know, i didn't actually read that sign until just now. probably just as well, i never would have gone up if i had read it first! |
Once we got to the mountain we were all gung ho and ready to go. About two minutes in I was already cursing my short legs and whining at Boyfriend to slow down. Once we got moving a bit I hit my stride and it got a little easier. Then I saw this:
I said "We're going up
that?" and Boyfriend said "Oh that's nothing, you just wait." I didn't get any pictures of how much worse it got, because I was too busy whimpering and telling Boyfriend to "Slow down!" and "Stop that! You'll fall to your death and you have my phone in the backpack!" There were people who clearly just do this for kicks, because they were legit
running up the mountain. I think one guy actually lapped us. Someone else had one kid strapped to a backpack on his back and was carrying a BABY. What if he fell? There goes your kids. Not very smart I say.
The views were beautiful, but it was definitely a lot more challenging than I anticipated. I was thanking my lucky stars I've been doing yoga for the past few month or so, because I don't think they would have made it otherwise. There were some moments when the rock was just flat in front of us, I had to use my hands and legs to get up a lot of it. I didn't even go all the way to the peak; I got high enough to see it and said "Good enough. I need a rest." Boyfriend went to the top though, that's him posing in the bottom right picture! I was in a complete panic about going back down the mountain, I was freaking out as we started our decent and said "What if we fall!? We might end up like that guy who had to cut his own arm off!" A fellow hiker heard me and laughed and said "I think he had to chew it off too." Great. I was whimpering again. But going down was not
nearly as bad as going up. By the time I got to the bottom my legs felt like jelly though.
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| having a little rest on our way down. |
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When we finally made it to the bottom I would have danced with happiness but my legs definitely would have given out. We still had the two hour drive home ahead of us. It was nice driving through all the cute little towns on our way home, I wish it was closer to the peak season of fall, it would have been so beautiful. We just managed to get some take-out from the Cheesecake Factory and eat it before completely passing out once we were home. My legs don't feel too bad today but Boyfriend has been laughing at me because I'm walking funny. I feel pretty proud of myself for climbing a mountain though! But I'm in no hurry to do it again too soon.
