Wooooo Hooooo
This was an absolutely amazing weekend, when I was made aware of this "gathering" I had mixed feelings...psyched to have a potentially outrageous gathering to attend, bummed that I wasn't strong enough to pull off a traverse with the group.
For various reasons I hadn't done anything over 10 miles in like 6 months before this weekend, last summer I wouldn't have even given it a second thought, this summer I just didn't have the confidence - I didn't feel that I was strong enough and was a bit "off" when I was driving up there, then I spoke to Jen. I asked her if she had been training for this and she replied, "No, I'm just going to tough it out," or something to that effect. "Well," I thought, "if that's her attitude, and everyone else is doing it, I'll just go into it with the same attitude."
An incredible day with an incredible group of people - like Jason said, the best July 4th I can remember! Hiking with this group was so much fun, and so distracting, that I never even thought about the physical challenge of it all, just looked forward to the next summit shot! Surprisingly enough, I even woke up feeling pretty good the next day and went out and hiked a section of trail known as the Ice Gulch - a gem of a hike - it gets referred to as a mini Mahoosuc but I'll tell you what I've done them both and I think they are equally amazing/challenging.
On a funny note, when I went to put my trail running shoes on to hike the Gulch I looked down and saw that I had to put my insoles back in then remembered that I had never taken them out - they were back home in my gear room... I had done the entire Presi Traverse in trail running shoes minus the insoles! I thought they felt a little loose on Friday
Thanks again to everyone, especially Mats for organizing the whole thing - looking forward to many more!
