Hiking for a Non-Hiker

Is hiking for everybody? Yes and No. I can’t stand when some people say anyone can do a certain sport or a certain exercise. Or people who say anyone can white water raft or anyone can swing a golf club. They really can’t. That’s not true. Quit saying that shit to people. I went white water rafting in college and the experience of it was thrilling, but a lot of the parts were not. For example, when everyone was supposed to be wielding a paddle, I froze up and just held mine in mid-air and my instructor literally hit me over the head with his in order to set me in motion again. I considered this absolutely cave-man-like, but maybe necessary? In order for us not to capsize. He also continued to repeat something about falling out of the boat and lifting up your legs so you didn’t break your knee caps and then someone would eventually fish you out of the water. I wanted to avoid the breaking of the legs and the fishing out of the water, and the possible mooning of everyone in the boat, so I think really that was why I stopped paddling, because I was trying to hold on so hard. I am pretty sure I lost that team building exercise, but they still let me eat the lunch at the end, which is all I ever really wanted anyways.

Hiking is different, hiking is more for everyone than roller coasters, zip lining and white water rafting and also this is a Covid summer and Covid summers are different than other summers and so you have to see what kind of Covid summer person that you are. Last summer I hiked Katahdin. I wasn’t good at it, I wasn’t ready for it, but I am so proud of it. Is it okay to say you hiked Katahdin if you didn’t technically get to the top? If your hands went numb from the sleet? and your shirt was soaked from the rain and the sweat and your turkey wrap was gone? Is it okay to say you did Katahdin if your legs felt like you did it and they were jello and and your joints were tin-man-like, but you never actually made it to the top, because you didn’t want to get zapped from all the lightening? That was me and that was last summer.

This summer, this weekend, I hiked Tumbledown. I like to say that to people I don’t know that well to see their reaction. I was at the grocery store picking out apples, saying oh my god my legs are so tired from hiking Tumbledown, and then I was pumping gas and I turned to the other pumper and said I have to get gas already this week because I drove to Tumbledown mountain. I emphasize all the syllables so that the other person will either be super impressed or super weirded out. Either way I just want a reaction.

I had to wake my kids up fairly early to meet our hiking party the day of the Tumbledown. They both refused breakfast because of the earliness, so I ate for three people and packed a lunch I was sure that I would like and they would eat if they were hungry enough. Then we drove to Weld Maine. We haven’t been driving many places together as a family, mostly because we annoy each other and also because we don’t have any place to go. My son instantly became car sick, I credit this to the Rona and his lack of bus rides. I still remained pretty chipper because I don’t get out much and also the scenery is pretty and there is a lot of Trump memorabilia and I find this fun. Fun to make fun of, or fun to do an air high five with. A little bit of something for everyone ya know? We took all the back roads to Weld Maine and so this did pose a bathroom problem. Public bathrooms were hard to come by before the Rona and they are doubly hard to come by with the Rona. This did not frustrate me however. I am what one of our young hikers refers to as a Gardiner girl. What is a Gardiner girl you might ask? I asked her this and she told me a Gardiner girl knows how to “rough it” in the woods or when the power is out. A Gardiner girl is a gal who can pee in the woods with little fan fair. This is why if you drove by at 10:12 in the morning on Sunday in the Weld Maine area, you might have found a 34-year-old female doing a pretty good sumo squat, with solid form, taking a tinkle along the side of the road. If you think you are too good for this you aren’t. Everyone puts their pants on the same way in the morning. All you have to do is open up the passengers side door and then the back door. One kid is the looker for oncoming traffic, the other one turns the music up and the driver is the escalator of the situation, hollering for you to hurry up and get to your business. Everything is really okay in the end. Also, there is an actual restaurant near Tumbledown called Fatty McGee’s or Big McGee’s Drive in, or Fatty Mcpatty MCGee’s and I’ll tell ya, thats good and comforting readers.

When you get to the dirt road, don’t stop, you are definitely at the right spot, but still need to do three more miles. You will either be comforted or nauseated by the bumpity bump of the dirt road and either reaction will be ignored by your entire family. Now get your backpack on reader, Spray on the bug spray with extra deet, grab your hiking stick or pepper spray because it is time for the woods. You are basically Reese Witherspoon in that Wild movie.

Now this is only my second time hiking with kids. It is a different experience. Not a bad experience, just different. Some hikers will whine a little. Please ignore them. Ignore them because they are messing with your nature, or ignore them because you are breathing so hard you can’t hear them anyways. It was usually the second for me. I can say a few times, when I was doing labor breathing toward the top and really getting my sweat on, a few friendly hikers would be on their way back down and make friendly but unwelcome comments. First of all, no one cares, and second of all I’m too tired to answer you. I can’t stand people that try to talk to you when they are coming down the mountain and you are coming up. Or people who have already passed the turn around point at a road race and are on the way back. It just feels so passive aggressive somehow, like they have super power that you do not and are breathing with ease as they finish what you could barely start. Most of them would say to me on Sunday,

“Hey look, the kids are really beating you huh? Suck to get old doesn’t it?”

First of all, chunk it and second of all, everyone runs like that after they eat three swedish fish. I am taking my time, Mr. khaki pants. And thirdly, no tripping on the way down, you roadrunner you!

But other than the fast hikers, the bugs, and the back sweat, I really enjoy hiking, like more than I thought I would. I like finding the right rocks to step on, I like the feeling of finishing something all in one day. I like eating trail mix while I’m burning calories. I like looking for the splash of blue paint on all the rocks and trees so I can Hansel and Gretel my path. I like torturing my legs all day and then ordering Thai food afterward and saying get it girl, have all you want, you earned it. Additionally Tumbledown, did not disappoint. It’s beautiful, its doable, and Netflix can only take you so far in this pandemic, after that, you gotta get out in the elements, out in the Ozarks.