Hurricane Hike

Mount Mansfield may be just 4393 feet high, but it acts like a much bigger mountain than that sometimes. As a dog who has skied from the summit, I feel I am an adequate judge. But never have I been up there on a day like last Saturday. It felt like a hurricane up there!

I first noticed the wind when we got out of the car. Everyone was gearing up for a nice autumn walk, but I was watching the treetops. They were going crazy! I, of course, didn't say anything, because I was just excited for a hike. And I think the whole group was excited: we had my usual humans, Ali and Mark, we had Doug McKain with his photographic trail-memory, Ruth Penfield who chronicled the journey on film (in fact, all photo credits on this post go to her), and Ryan McKain who was visiting for a little weekend hiking and fishing.

We went up the Laura Cowles trail because we thought it might be a little better sheltered than some of the other routes. Sheltered? Maybe. Dry? Uh...no. Water was pouring down that trail like a river! Again, it didn't bother me; I just slopped right through it and drank whenever I wanted. I found myself in somewhat of an ironic situation; I was carrying two small water bottles in my dog-backpack. Yet everywhere we went, water was seeping out of that mountain!

At the top, the wind was blowing 75 mph. The view was great, if your definition of "great view" is 15-feet of visibility with wispy grey fog flying past you. My ears and lips flapped in the wind, and everyone's jackets filled with air. They looked like a bunch of weight-lifters, their jackets were so poofed out!

Rather than descend the exposed Sunset Ridge Trail, we walked the Mt. Mansfield ridge to the Canyon North Extension to the Halfway House trail. The Halfway House was nice, but the Canyon Extension was slippery and kind of treacherous. I was a little nervous and at one point refused to climb over some slippery rocks -- even when someone offered me cookies. Hey, I like dog cookies, don't get me wrong. But not enough to die for. They're not steaks, you know.

Anyway, we got past the sketchy spots. I had a great time bounding around in the woods and hanging out with our group. One nice thing about the weather was that there were very few people hiking Saturday. To go up there on a day like that, you have to be seriously deranged... or you must must really like hiking.