It was already 9:45 in the morning when Eric finally texted me: "So what's the plan?"The plan was shot. I was now two months into my "funemployment", quite on edge and easily irritated, like some long-caged animal. I hadn't left the city in what seemed like an eternity and it exacerbated my stress. I am not a creature meant for long periods of urban life. I was panicked and forlorn. How long would this jobless monotony go on? Every day, I wake up, apply to jobs, and wait for responses that would not come. Any penny spent filled me with guilt and fear. I was not myself, and I needed to be rid of this burden, if even for an afternoon.
To assuage this pressure, Eric, Pat and I had intended on driving out to North Adams early in the morning to hike Mount Greylock. I'd been up since 6:30, calling and texting Eric incessantly, to no avail. By 9:45, He told me he was on his way in to Boston, but it was unlikely that we could begin our hike until after noon at this rate, meaning the plan was likely dead.
But damn his eyes, I would still have my hike! I consulted Google Maps, switching on the terrain setting and searching furiously for a good mountain to climb that wasn't 3+ hours away -- not an easy task. Then, I moved downstairs, pacing and energized by too much coffee, when my roommate Tom found me. Tom is a good man, bearded and jolly, with an unparalleled love of hockey and a propensity to deliver jokes by shouting them, as though angered. He is also from the Great White North.
"Tom!" I started, pointing my finger at him. "You're from New Hampshire!"
"Uh-huh."
"Where can I go hiking that isn't a million fucking miles away."
"Well, let me think on that." He said, stroking his beard, a slight smile visible beneath his facial hair. "You know, there's this place 'bout two hours from Boston called Mount Cardigan. It's got a granite top, so the views are great. We used to go there a bunch when I was younger."
I shouted with joy and hugged him before running off to wake Pat and inform Eric of our new itinerary.
"Pat!" I shouted, throwing his door ajar. "We're going to Mount Cardigan!"
"Okay, whatever," Pat murmured from beneath his pillow. "Sounds good. I'll be up in a minute."
Before long, we were on our way north, blasting Mean Jeans and Diarrhea Planet (yes, that's a band's name) in Pat's Rav 4 as we left the suburban sprawl of the Greater Boston Area. Soon, deep in the Granite State, we left the highway, taking a road that wound through farmland, passing cows and derelict barns that were slowly sagging from years of hard New Hampshire winters.
The parking lot for the trail head was set next to a very large, well-maintained AMC lodge. It was a bright, sunny day, warm and mildly humid. Crickets, bullfrogs and songbirds filled the air with their chorus as we strapped on our bags and made our way to the shaded trail. Once inside the darkened forest, the air was still, quiet. What bits of sunlight made their way through the canopy illuminated the bright green maple and beech leaves. I breathed deep, intoxicated by the fresh air, the solitude, the calm quiet. A low din of crickets could be heard far off, but mostly our ears were filled with the dull ringing of the forest calm. Two hundred years ago, the air would have been full of feathered ballads, but industrialization and other things deemed "progress" have stripped our forests of their songs. The calls of many eastern songbirds have left Appalachia forever, leaving the forests silent.
As we made our way up the mount, the air grew thicker and the trees changed from maples, oaks and beech to fir and pine, the ground coated with a soft blanket of moss. Large rocks and mud marked our path up Cardigan as sweat dripped from our heads. We paused at a rocky outcrop on the eastern side of the mountain, admiring the foothills of the White Mountains as they snaked northward. The mountains and hills, emerald in the foreground, dissolved into blue as they rolled away.
* * * *
Before long, the evergreens grew stunted and the dome of Cardigan emerged, bald and gray, statuesque against the bright blue sky. We splashed through puddles on the flat, winding trail, me running my fingers over the short fir trees. Suddenly, Eric shouted and jumped back. I peered ahead to see what had happened. On the trail before us, I spotted a long serpent slinking across the path: A milk snake. I hadn't seen a wild milk snake in, well, perhaps ever (at least not a living one). I'm sure you, dear reader, will not be surprised to hear that I quickly ran ahead of my companions and attempted to snatch up the snake. I was surprised, however, that the reptile did not share my enthusiasm for a meeting. It recoiled and struck out at me. Missing me by a large margin, it pulled back, mouth open, ready to strike again.
"You're a god damned child, Rory!" Pat shouted. "Just leave the snake alone."
Pat stood by, impatient but amused, while Eric stood behind him, looking in another direction, ignoring the snake (you may recall Eric is not a fan of snakes). I studied the asp for another moment, trying to see if there was another way to grab it. There was not -- it was well prepared for my advances and shot out at me every time I got too close. I stepped back and let it leave the trail before we pushed on.
Soon, we left the trees behind and climbed over bare granite, specks of mica glistening in the afternoon sun. In 1855, the area suffered a devastating wild fire, leaving Cardigan's summit naked of trees. The treeless top allows the hiker to admire impressive views of the White Mountains to the north -- jagged and formidable, even at this distance -- and the foothills that slowly give way to the rolling land which flows into Massachusetts. Peering south, we noticed a shimmer on the horizon: Boston, some 90 miles away.
I secured my hat to my head as a swift wind picked up from the west. We rested at the base of the fire tower that sits atop the mountain and enjoyed a small lunch -- a peanut butter, honey and jelly sandwich for me, my usual. There were two other groups on the summit that afternoon: A group of wine and beer-drinking grad students, talking about craft beer festivals, thesis defenses and other such dreadful conversations to overhear; and a couple who was being pestered by what I presumed were their dogs. A hound mix and retriever were licking the couple's faces and smelling their lunch, obediently waiting for their share of the food. But then, one of the now-buzzed grad students shouted out for the beasts, and the dogs returned to the large group -- their rightful owners. It was not long after this that the dogs came to see if we had any food to offer them. We patted the dogs but refused to share our rations. This deterred them little. After a few minutes of guarding our food from these famished beasts, their owner called them over again. This time, instead of returning to the grad students, who were now talking about geo-politics and a beer you can only find in some remote Colorado town, the dogs ran over to the couple again. I could not blame the canines, the conversation was dreary. After a few more minutes, the dogs went back to the grad students and then charged over to us. They repeated this pattern until we left, the dogs' owner unable to maintain control of his animals, or at least unable to care about keeping them out of other people's food. If only someone would invent some sort of rope we could attach to a dog's collar to keep them close!
We ran around the summit for a bit longer, enjoying the sun's warmth and the endless landscape around us. The afternoon rolled on and our trio made way for the trail. Back in the tree line, a pair of voles shot out onto the trail in front of Pat, causing him to stop. They ran circles around his beat-up shoes, chasing each other playfully before returning to the underbrush.
* * * *
The hike down was brief and the air grew warm and thick as we came to the base. The roar of a rushing stream followed us on our left as we descended. Below the trail, we spotted a waterfall that drained into a small pool. We slid down the side of the trail's ledge and took off our shoes, plunging out sweaty feet into the cold, crisp water. Small brown trout darted about in the pool as we made our way to the waterfall. I cupped water in my hands and splashed it over my face, my pores constricting from the sudden cold.
We finished the trail and wandered through the AMC lodge, looking at taxidermied animals and guidebooks about local flora and fauna. Outside, there was a small pond with a dock in it, presumably for thru-hikers to relax on. I wandered around the pond's edge, watching leopard and pickerel frogs jump into the clear water.
"You know," Pat chuckled to Eric. "I feel like we're Rory's dads right now."
Eric bellowed a hardy laugh.
"Alright son!" He called. "Time to get going."
I laughed, but went on with my exploration. Small black shapes whipped through the water, and at first I made them for tadpoles. But soon, I realized that these were eastern spotted newts. Like all amphibians, newts pass through several stages of metamorphosis, and these were the fully-aquatic adult variety (not the land-dwelling, crimson "elf" stage). I watched them swim about in the water, occasionally pausing to rest on the sandy ground, suspended as if unbound by gravity. As I made my way around the pond, however, I was alarmed to notice more and more dead newts. By the time I'd made my way around the body of water, it seemed that the ratio of living to dead newts was about 1:1. I looked around to see what could be causing the die off and noticed a black, plastic pipe protruding from the ground nearby, emitting a trail brown-green sludgy vomit that bled into the pond. Good luck to whatever thru-hiker took a swim in this, I thought.
As Eric and Pat got back in the car, I stared up at the forest and mountain beyond as a calmness washed over me, renewed. My shoulders slacked and I inhaled slowly, getting the last of the mountain air in my lungs before we returned to Boston. I felt good. I felt like myself again.
Driving down the dirt road out of the state forest, I put on Ashokan Farewell (I'd been watching a lot of Ken Burn's Civil War). The fiddles and guitar danced and as we made our way past rolling farmland, stunted mountains visible beyond.
"You know," Pat said, turning to me. "It's a lot different driving up through all this New Hampshire farmland listening to Mean Jeans. This makes the drive, like, a whole different animal."
