Love The Ride

gimme my pack
and a bike with 1 gear
some Pringles in a stack
and i'm outta here

torque and wattage
i climb the mountain
pass the cottage
miles? not countin'

runnin' on fumes
my body's a sponge
can o' legumes,
legs covered in grunge

hours blend to days
moods like tides
i can only live this way
man, do i love the ride


krp

spring running, an ode

ipad
itouch
ipod
icannotescape
the doorknob:
only threshold iknow

the trail calls my name
i willingly accept
ignite my flame
with uncounted steps

"the real world: just
bills, money, and counting cash"
instead, i must
get thrills running through mountain ash

push past pines
each step a revival
pricked by thorny vines
my drug is survival

stop on the ridge
breathe in, breathe out
never give an inch
that's not what i'm about

overcast gives way
to a sunrise at five
i am moving
because i'm alive

krp

Mt. Pisgah, Winthrop/Monmouth, Maine 2/13/2011

One of my good buddies is starting to do some hiking.

Boydie is now living in the Augusta area, so the three of us decided to bag a small mountain in a place close by. Mt. Pisgah, a small, 810' hill seemed to fit the bill.

The trail starts out looking like a snowmobile trail, but about a hundred yards in, a snowshoe trail branches off to the left.

It was well packed...so packed that we had no use for our snowshoes, and ended up carrying them all the way to the top.
There were some cool trees, but not a lot to look at as the trail wound to the top.

The elevation alone told us this would be a short hike, but I had no idea we would be to the top in 25 minutes.

A fire tower is surprisingly open to the public to climb, and the views are actually pretty great from there. We were able to see 360 degrees for miles, and could even glimpse Mount Washington.
Lots of interesting graffiti inside the tower as well.

Not wanting to backtrack, we took the snowmobile trail back down, which was actually steeper than the snowshoe trail.

The bottom line: This is an extremely easy hike. If you just happen to be passing through Winthrop, Monmouth, or Wayne and have an hour to kill on a nice day, or want a nice family hike, this is the one for you.
Enjoy.

krp

**Photos by N Du

Baldpate West Peak 3662'

Headed once again to Western Maine's Grafton Notch for another assault of the park's numerous peaks. I love that place.
Not only is it close by, no one is there. This makes for a great hiking experience in my book.
My goal was to get to both the East and West Peak of Baldpate, but I wasn't sure my late start time of 1pm would allow for it.

I was surprised to see that the trail was broken, but not since the last storm. This made for about 4-5 inches underfoot. Fairly easy going on snowshoes.
My suspicions were correct when I hit the Table Rock turn. More traffic had gone that way than on the AT, which was the direction I was going.

Often times, the trail was drifted in and I had to either look for the White Blaze or just kind of guess whether or not I was on the trail. The White Blazes were more often than not covered by snow.
I got to the hut and realized I had gone too far, because there was no visible trail anymore. There were some ominous dark clouds rolling in so I just kind of sat in the hut, eating and drinking, trying to decide whether to bag the trip or not.
It was 2:15. I figured I had enough daylight, and if the clouds produced anything, I would just turn around.

Backtracked about 200 yards and found the trail sign hidden behind a snow-covered pine tree. No one had been this way in a while.

It was only a mile to the top, but it was a slog. The blazes were only visible every once in a while, so it was kind of a matter of following where there were gaps in the trees. The snow was knee deep most of the way and at times I was forced to scramble on hands and knees on some of the steeper parts. 1 mile took an hour.
I didn't hang around at the top. Took a picture of the East Peak, which looked way cooler, and headed down.
That mile down was so fun. I slid on my snowshoes almost the whole way. Going up: 1hour. Going down: 15 minutes.

Another hour later, and I was back to the car.
Total trip time: 3.5 hours.
Very strenuous because of the snow, specifically the last mile to the peak.

Highly recommended, but take more time to stop and smell the roses.
I need to break my habit of rushing these things.
Peace out!
krp

never

a round hole
i'm the square peg
a free soul
on two legs

in a world of serious
i'm that cloud, adrift
oblivious, delirious
i cannot make the shift

not frozen alive
by the cold of the corporate
rather barely survive
with more to show for it

the "real world" cannot touch me
as i run on mountain tops
effortless, above the trees
never slow down, never stop

-krp

Western Mountain Extravaganza

Time sure does fly when you go from adventure to adventure.

Last week, I was dropped off in Bethel. Rode my bike up to Grafton Notch via 26. With the wind coming straight at my face from the north, it did not make for a comfortable ride.
By the time I hit the parking lot of Old Speck, my feet were absolutely frozen.

I sat at the picnic tables and changed into my regular shoes and microspikes. This was right before the big snowstorm, so I really wasn't expecting too much snow until the top of the mountain. I hiked my bike up the mountain for awhile, and stashed it just high enough where I figured no one would want to be bothered with taking it down, and then went to work.
It was about 10am when I hid the bike, and I still had about 2.5 miles to go. The sky was cloudless and blue, and there was no wind.
I wanted to hit the peak and have the same conditions, so I flew up the mountain, on occasion going so hard that breakfast would try and escape my gut. The closer I got to the top, the slower I went.
It felt like I just couldn't take enough pictures of the snow on the trees with the perfect scenery in the background. The day, the scenery, the whole experience was just perfect.

There was lots of ice, but never a time where I felt I was making an unsafe move. When I got to the top, I took it all in and ate about 500 brownies. Food always tastes better at the top of a mountain. Especially on a day this clear.

My liquids started to freeze after 20 minutes, so I made short work of the descent. There were times you could get on your butt and slide for 50-100 yards at a time. It had just enough snow that the sliding wasn't too fast or dangerous. I was still wearing bike shorts under all my layers, so roots and rocks didn't really create issues for my behind.

I reconnected with my bike, hiked it down, and changed into my bike gear. It was only 2pm, but the sun was behind the big mountain, and I was COLD.
Quickly changed into bike gear and headed up 26 on my way to East B Hill Road. The rest of 26 was a 10 mile uphill, and my legs were super tired from going so hard up the mountain...the 40 pound pack that contained the week's food and drink on my back didn't make the climb any easier either.

Seeing a coyote let my mind wander for a while... I wondered what he was doing at this time of day, and whether or not he would choose to scavenge me should I die of mental misery.

Turning on East B Hill Road, I knew it was basically all downhill into Andover, where my camp is located, so I figured I was basically done. It was an unpleasant surprise to see that this road had snow on it. A road bike+snow and ice+pavement=severe danger. I stopped riding, started swearing, and changed into regular shoes, and basically walked the whole road....riding where there were patches of pavement.

By the time I hit Andover General Store, it was pitch dark. I got my lights on, bought some food and drink, and rode the last couple of miles into camp. Once I got the fire going, I had some Sam Winter, some food, shot the shit with my Dad, and crashed HARD.

The next couple of days were spent preparing the camp for some great people to join me for the weekend. We hit up Dunn Falls via snowshoe, went cross country skiing up Devil's Den, and visited the canyon...a staple for each camp visit. Extra curricular activities included sledding both downhill and behind car, deca-flipcup, olympic cheese ball eating, bonfire building, and chili enthusiasm.

I love being TentMan.

***topmost photo of canyon is Anneliese Behrman's

I'm sitting by the fire at camp on a sunny, blue sky morning.
About 8 inches of snow fell yesterday.

Every time I come here to our cabin in the mountains, I can't help but realize how much happier I am in such a basic setting. Here, civilization as we know it could be destroyed and I wouldn't have a clue as I went about the daily tasks of preparing food, shoveling, and getting wood and water.

We have so many "things" in our society. "This new ___ will make my life so much easier, and save me so much more time and money!"

I ask, how could things get any easier for us, and what are we REALLY going to do with our spare time?
We live in a world where everything is instantaneous. The only reason we work a zillion hours a week, is to afford the things that we don't need.

If we are lucky enough to have a day without work, our technology make it easy for us to misuse our spare time. God did not intend us to spend an entire saturday watching tv. And people wonder why they feel so lethargic, sitting around for an entire day. You string a couple of those days together, and lethargy turns into depression.

I think we need to go back a hundred years. You don't have time to be depressed when there's wood to be chopped, because let's face it, if you don't chop that wood, your going to die of hypothermia.

The formula is simple.
Stop it.
Do you NEED 300 channels? Do you NEED a new car when yours works fine and is paid off?
Edward Abbey said,"Growth for the sake of growth is the ideology of a cancer cell."

In this American society where bigger better faster stronger is the attitude, scale it back.
Enjoy life at the slower pace it was intended to be lived at!

krp