9/22/12: THE FIRST
DAY OF AUTUMN AS SEEN FROM THE TOP OF A MOUNTAIN
The winds are too strong.
Instead we take a five minute drive south to the other side of the
island for a quick and gusty look at Allen Point, during which my right hearing
aid battery dies. I beg for a quick stop
back at the house for a battery swap.
This is where the ferry used to come through.
From here it’s off to Stowe to drive up a mountain.
We don’t really have a plan, other than to
drive as far up a ski slope as we can to see what we can see.
First we come across a resort, huge and
imposing in front of an array of trails cut into the mountainside.
A couple of workers in the visitor center
give us advice: drive up to Smuggler’s Notch first; then, turn around and drive
up the Toll Road.
From there, take the
mile-long trail up to the summit of Mount Mansfield.
So that’s what we do.
The road to Smuggler’s Notch is narrow, winding, and
steep. There is a collective groan from
our car full of cyclists every time we round a bend onto a hairpin turn.
At the Toll Road we are given a CD to listen to.
We get a history of this road, a former
carriage road, as we ascend.
Blacktop
has given way to dirt.
“She didn’t tell
us about this!”
Larry laments.
At the top, the parking lot is nearly full.
The trail is across rock.
At first we are enveloped by balsam fir.
Lynne and I inhale deeply.
“Mmmmmm.”
The trees get shorter.
Now we’re following white blazes painted on open rock.
A line of twine on either side keeps us on
the trail and off the lichen and knee-high trees.
The wind whips in from the edge of the
mountain, pushing us forward, howling into my hearing aids.
I want to turn them off, to put them in my
pocket, but I have nothing safe to put them in, and, besides, we’re moving
along at a fair clip.
I stop every so often for a picture.
The view doesn’t change much as we
ascend.
We are up around 4000 feet.
Lake Champlain is in the far distance.
I can’t distinguish it from the sky and haze
on the horizon.
Distant mountains look
blue.
The ground far below is brown.
We’re ascending now.
Larry, in a pair of old boat shoes, is beginning to lose his
footing.
I stay behind him just in case
he topples, which he almost does once.
Then the trail leads downhill sharply.
We’re using our hands, putting our feet in
cracks between the rocks. I dare not
look anywhere but down. To look left or
forward would make me dizzy. As much to
calm Larry as to calm myself, I remember a line from a movie, a quote from Jack
Kerouac: “You can’t fall off a
mountain.”
The path evens out again.
Then we climb, reaching a rise close to the summit. Clouds blow in at eye level. I sit down to rest and take pictures. Tom zooms in on a hiker standing on a ledge
in the distance.
Larry breaks out a
Power Bar and shares it.
We look up to
the summit, easily just a few minutes away.
Back where we came from the sky is clouding up.
We decide that this is good enough.
Descending, I walk in front of Larry so he can watch where
I’ve stepped.
I’m pretty good at
rock-hopping.
I misstep once in a while,
though.
“Don’t do that,” I tell him, not
looking back.
“I won’t,” he
answers.
This routine is repeated more
than once.
The parking lot is only slightly less crowded when we
return.
“Lunch, I think,” I suggest.
We drive back to Stowe, grab cheap eats at a sandwich shop
(out of anything veggie that I’d want to eat, so I pick at a scone and drink
milk from a carton), and wander through a shop full of tacky Vermont
memorabilia. It’s worth it, though,
because, among the jams and relishes open for sampling, Cheryl has found
cinnamon raisin peanut butter. She leads
me to it, crackers in hand. Lunch. But for $8.50 a jar, there’s no way we’re
taking it home.
I’ve found another stuffed moose and some local cheese to
take home.
Lynne buys a bag of horehound
candy, which three of us try, unsure what, exactly, it tastes like.
Caramel or maple syrup or root beer, but not
quite any of those.
Larry and Cheryl are
nursing the coffees they’d bought at the sandwich shop.
On to the Ben and Jerry’s factory. Fortunately, for those of us who aren’t
really interested in the tour, no ice cream is being made today, so Larry and
Tom decide against it. We get into the
long line for ice cream instead. I find
a smoothie made with frozen Greek yogurt.
It tastes like frozen yogurt used to taste 30 years ago, before people
figured out how to make it not taste like yogurt.
As we walk to the car, the rain begins.
It’s coming down steadily as we cross onto
South Hero Island.
The wind has died
down.
We put in dinner orders at the
same pizza shop as two nights ago (a real hole in the wall, a one-woman
operation, no seating, antique typewriters, photographs of a Florida swamp,
cash only).
The storm moves out.
Between bouts of packing and cleaning, we talk about leading
bike rides and other deep-in-the-weeds, we’ve-been-FreeWheelers-forever
subjects that would make an outsider’s ears bleed. I’m here in a cabin at the edge of a lake,
with bikers I’ve known for over a decade, talking Club shop. I suppose that
makes me an Old Timer.
Tomorrow we’ll head back home in the morning, stopping in
Saratoga Springs to visit a former FreeWheeler whom Cheryl and Tom have known
for years. I don’t remember him much,
but I do remember his email address, even though I probably never used it. Cheryl will be spending the night there. Tom is taking me home.
It’s time for me to look over today’s pictures and then pack
up this computer. I have to make
everything fit into the cab of Tom’s truck.
Some stuffed mooses might get squished during shipment.
