I can think of three rational explanations for our apparently irrational behavior:

1) It was one of the longest days of the year – over 16 hours of daylight to play with.

2) We had perfect hiking weather, cool and breezy.

3) We also had two new pairs of ultralightweight summer hiking boots, just broken in and begging to be used.

In retrospect, however, rational reasoning was irrelevant. The whole thing was about as rational as the testosterone-driven desire for a red sports car.

EasternSlopes.com Publisher David Shedd, and I decided to put our new hiking boots and ourselves to the test on a really long one-day hike. We chose the Monadnock-Sunapee Greenway which runs from Mount Sunapee to Mount Monadnock in southwestern New Hampshire.

One reason: The Greenway is relatively easy walking over much of its length but still very beautiful. Another: convenient road crossings made it (theoretically) easy to bail out (almost) any time we wanted to. Third reason, there’s a wonderful guidebook, the Monadnock-Sunapee Greenway Trail Guide available which covers the entire trail and provides a very detailed waterproof map.

But the real reason is that, sometime around 1980, when the trail was brand new, I’d walked the entire length in one shot, climbing Sunapee by flashlight in the morning, down from Monadnock by flashlight at night. I remember being a little tired and footsore by the end, but having great fun. Of course I was younger then . . .

Our goal this time was to walk as much of the trail as we could in one day. My sweetheart Marilyn wanted to spend the day not hiking which left her available to pick us up wherever we decided to quit.

The day before our hike, I cached  hydration bladders of water at each road crossing. We ended the hike with several empty water bladders each in our packs.

Up at 3 a.m., we ate a huge breakfast and continued snacking  on our drive to Sunapee. We left the car at 4:15, climbed almost halfway up the mountain in the dusky light, climbed back down to retrieve a forgotten cell phone (which we needed to call for pickup), and then started our hike.

Needless to say, we didn’t make the summit by sunrise. Rains the evening before left the rocks on top of the mountain slippery which slowed us even more. The ledges  on top offered treacherous footing–our hiking poles made it easier but still not easy.

But by 11 in the morning, we’d still managed to complete the hike-and-a half to the summit of Sunapee and an additional 16.4 miles over Kittredge Hill and Lovewell Mountain to NH Route 31 and the village of Washington, NH, where we topped up our fuel reserves at the lunch counter in the General Store there.

At that point, we had to decide whether to quit or push on. That decision was made for us when we were offered a ride that let us bypass some road walking and re-start on the Old Kings Highway, a dirt road now used by ATVs.

The trail had been re-routed in this section, some of the signage was gone, and we missed the trail. To get back on track, we bushwhacked cross-lots by compass, eventually found the trail only one very thick and deep swamp later, and continued on our way over Hubbard Hill and Pitcher Mountain to NH Route 123 which is, theoretically 26.8 miles from Sunapee.

We quit there, very footsore but quite satisfied with out effort. According to the GPS and altimeter we carried, we had actually hiked 26.4 miles in 11 hours of actual walking time (we were on the trail almost exactly 12 hours). When moving, we averaged 2.3 miles per hour, and climbed almost 6000 vertical feet. David wore a heart rate monitor which calculated his average heart rate at 122, max heart rate at 166 and his total calorie burn at 6,061 calories. Great workout.

So,  we have about half the trail left to do . . .maybe in one day, maybe in two.

What about you? Have you been irrational lately? Attempted something you probably can’t finish just for the pure fun of trying? Just be safe while you’re doing it, OK?

Life isn’t a spectator sport. Get out and enjoy!

How Long IS Long?

One of the things I’ve always found slightly puzzling is that lots of hiking trails seem to start on the top of one mountain and end on the top of another.

The classic examples are the Appalachian Trail , which starts on Springer Mountain in Georgia and ends some 2,160 miles later on top of Katahdin in Maine and the Long Trail which “starts” and “ends” in the middle of nowhere at the northern and southern borders of Vermont

How are you supposed to get up to the starting point and down from the finish? Helicopter? Teleportation?

Officially the Monadnock-Sunapee Greenway is 48.6 miles long but that doesn’t include the hike to the top of Mount Sunapee  which ranges from 2.6 to 3 miles depending on which route you take to start, and the two-plus-mile hike down from Monadnock at the end. Or vice versa, obviously. So it’s over 53 miles however you look at it.

I suppose the justification is that there are lots of different routes up and down some popular mountains. But it’s also easy enough to designate one route as “the trail.”

Mistakes Along The Way

Other than leaving the cell phone (which we needed to schedule pickup) on the charger in the car and losing the route apparently  because of a missing sign, we made a couple of other faulty decisions. Nothing serious, just reminders to be more careful next time.

We calculated out food to carry—primarily gorp, energy bars and tuna packets–at the rate of 150 calories per hour. Then we added enough food to allow for 200 calories an hour. But we burned well over 500/hour. If it hadn’t been for that wonderful oasis in Washington, we’d have either had to quit early or hike hungry.

Caching food doesn’t always work when there are rodents and raccoons around—not to mention that this is bear country . . .

The other mistake I made was not paying enough attention to my feet. I thought I’d broken my new boots in adequately, but wet feet (these are mesh boots—cooler in summer but not waterproof) and socks I’d never worn before raised a pretty good blister.  Surprisingly, it wasn’t painful, and was easily covered and protected with a waterproof bandage, but it did prevent us from hiking the next day.

No matter how experienced you are, you still make mistakes. They just get smaller and, usually, easier to deal with — most of the time, anyway.

At least we had sense enough not to try for another 10 miles . . .but stay tuned for the story of us hiking the rest of the trail!