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Before we set out Saturday morning from our campsite at Yellow Mountain Gap on the Appalachian Trail, I outlined the morning plan. “We’ve got a long climb — 900 vertical feet in 1.7 miles — up to Little Hump Mountain. We’ll take a break there. Then head on to Hump Mountain for lunch.”

The afternoon before we’d started from Carver’s Gap around 1:30. “The first mile is one long great view,” I explained. “Sunset isn’t until 8:03, so we’ve got plenty of time.”

I’d made a variation of that speech on at least a dozen previous trips on this revered 14-mile run of the AT from Carver’s Gap to US 19E. The backpackers are always glad to hear there’s no rush — then proceed to rush after paying brief homage to the more deserving views. Maybe spend 5 minutes at Round Bald, taking in the 360-degree views of everything from Roan High Knob to Grassy Ridge to ridge after ridge fading west into Tennessee, a few minutes less at adjoining Jane Bald. The grass is always greener at the next bald, apparently.

But this group was different. We hung out at Round Bald for a good 15 minutes, stayed nearly as long at Jane Bald. Even after descending into the mountain ash forest at Roan Mountain, we stopped frequently, for the wildflowers (white snakeroot, yellow sneezeweed), to check out a briskly running spring, to enjoy more wildflowers.

To be clear, these three hikers weren’t stopping to catch their breath. I’d hiked with all three before: Marie had done one of the toughest trips we do, the four-day, 37-mile Virginia Triple Crown; Nick’s done several trips, including the rugged Joyce Kilmer Wilderness; and Sue has done most of our trips and had just gotten back from a 7-day trip with the Sierra Club in the White Mountains. They’re three of the strongest folks I hike with.

With all the stops we still made it to camp before 5 p.m. — three hours before sunset, with plenty of time to enjoy camp.

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When we set out Saturday morning — sleeping in and leaving camp around 9 — I was prepared for another leisurely day on the trail. We stopped about 15 minutes in at a clearing overlooking where we’d camped. We stopped a short while later to check out an ancient barbed wire fence atop the razor-sharp ridge (“They had cattle up here?”). We stopped to check out a likewise perplexing ridgeline roadbed that had once, presumably, served a vital function. When we topped 5,453-foot Little Hump Mountain, we dropped our packs and settled in for the view. 

Fifteen minutes later we were back on the trail, descending off the bald into another mountain ash forest, then into Bradley Gap at the base of Hump Mountain, the entire mile-long climb visible before us.

“We’ll stop for lunch at the top,” I said.

I’ve done this trip in good weather in the past (I’ve also done it in blinding rain), but the conditions this past weekend were the best I’d ever seen. The temperature was in the upper 60s, early on there wasn’t a cloud in the sky. When we reached the top of Hump Mountain a few scattered and harmless white clouds were drifting in from the west. We stopped at a rock outcrop with a plaque honoring Stan Murray, founder of the Southern Appalachian Highlands Conservancy, the perfect place to stretch out for lunch. 

“We’ll hang out here a little longer than usual,” I said. “How does an hour sound?” Later, Sue said she was expecting me to say 20 minutes. “You rarely get a lunch break that long on a guided hike.”

After an hour had come and gone, I surveyed my fellow hikers. One appeared to be asleep; one, who’d set up her Helinox camp chair, appeared to be in a trance; one was gazing intently to the southeast. “It’s only a little over an hour to camp,” I said. “If we leave now, we’ll be there by 2:30. You good with staying here a while longer?” They were. So we stayed another hour.

I recall maybe 10 words being said that whole time. I drifted in and out of a light sleep, thoughts pingponging to unexpected places. At first, I smelled a hamburger, a specific hamburger, one from the grill at a pool where I grew up. That made me think of water and my Mike Nelson phase, which made me think of Gragg Prong in the Wilson Creek area, the best summer swimming hole in the Southeast. I thought about my first swimming hole, a mountain reservoir near where I went to school, where I spent a summer diving into its icy waters, then sunning on its exposed granite. I remembered that odd, orange glow on the insides of my closed eyelids, the same glow I was feeling now. It was the feeling of being young, without a care in the world. It was the holy grail of being in the wild.

* * *

As our shuttle driver was unloading us at Carver’s Gap Friday, one of our group said, “Well, maybe we’ll see you again on Sunday.”

“Sunday?” he huffed. “You’re taking two nights to do this? You’re gonna get bored.” 

It struck me as an odd thing to say for someone who makes a living based on hikers’ love affair with these mountains. It also struck me as flat out wrong. Later, recalling the exchange, I told the group, “You could do this trail every week for the rest of your life and not get bored.”

Especially when you take the time to enjoy.

* * *

Last chances

Eager for that feel-like-a-kid feeling on the trail? We have two that can’t miss.

GetBackpacking! Virginia’s Triple Crown. We have one more backpack trip on the schedule this year, one more opportunity this year to feel young! It’s a four-day, 35-mile trip in late October taking in Virginia’s Triple Crown: McAfee Knob, Tinker Cliffs and Dragon’s Tooth. Learn more and sign up to join us here. Two spots remain.

GetHiking! Weekend Classic Escape on the AT at Hot Springs. Not into camping but love hiking? We’ve got one other last chance just for you, our GetHiking! Fall Weekend Escape on the Appalachian Trail at Hot Springs. Stay in the Hot Springs Lodge/Cabins, enjoy two days of late fall (first weekend in November) hiking on the Appalachian Trail. Learn more and sign up to join us here.

The post The slower the better: a weekend on the AT appeared first on GetGoing NC!.

Saturday’s forecast calls for a high of 28 degrees at Hanging Rock State Park in Danbury. That will occur long after we’re off the trail . For the most part, we’ll be hiking in the low 20s. But it will be sunny, and a little sun can make up for a lot of cold.

North Carolina has, on average, 28 clear days every winter; only seven states see more cloudless days, according to data compiled from two climate agencies. Virginia averages 25 clear days. In short, you could live in much worse places to avoid feeling SAD

SAD, or Seasonal Affective Disorder, is a type of depression that can set in when the days are short and the sun sets early in the day. Once this mood-altering disorder takes hold, according to the Mayo Clinic, it can be hard to shake; it’s best to fight it off before it has a chance to make itself at home, leaving you hibernating in a stupor of despair.

One way to combat SAD, says the Mayo Clinic, is to go outside and move—the more regularly, the better. Even when it’s cold, a brisk walk in outdoor light can help. Another way to lift your mood is to be with other people; socializing with a dose of laughter helps you connect with others, an opportunity in short supply these days. Hiking regularly also can reduce levels of stress, which can contribute to SAD symptoms. According to psychiatry.org, 5 percent of Americans experience SAD, with the most severe bouts occurring in January and February.

Frankly, all of us could stand to reduce our stress levels. So, even if SAD doesn’t get you down, brisk movement and being with others is a great way to keep stress at bay by releasing endorphins and elevating mood.

So while the benefits of being out in the sun are beneficial year round, they are even more so in the short days of winter. But because of the cold, you sometimes need a little extra motivation to drag yourself outside and make it happen. And the best motivation? you ask. 

Hike with a group. 

It’s one time when peer pressure is a good thing. You wake up, you see it’s 28 degrees, you pull the covers back over your head and reach blindly for the snooze button. But then you remember the group waiting for you at the trailhead. You remember that Sue was supposed to hear about that promotion this week, that Jack was on the verge of adopting a shelter dog, that last week when Elliot failed to show he was the topic of discussion. You also remember that, once you’re 5 minutes down the trail and starting to warm up, you really love hiking this time of year. 

The obvious current caveat about hiking in a group: while being outdoors is still considered safe, you want to make doubly sure the group you’re hiking with is safe. With any group you join, be it a hiking-related Meetup or a group from work, find out what their policy is and see if it’s one you’re comfortable with.

It may take a hike or two to find the group that’s right for you. That’s fine. Because once you do find a group that works, you’ll find yourself spending a lot more time on the trail at a time of year when it will do you the most good.

The post Embrace the cold, avoid getting SAD appeared first on GetGoing NC!.

So rather than just leading hikes, I hoped to empower those with me to feel comfortable hiking on their own. Expose people to a variety of trails, on varying terrain, in a variety of conditions, both day and night, and it wouldn’t be long before I might see them just once or twice a year because otherwise they’d be exploring on their own. I even created a class, GetOriented! Finding Your Way in the Woods, to teach basic map and compass skills and how to read a topo map and the terrain. All the tools.

Every once in a while, that vision plays out. Someone hikes with us for a couple months, I don’t see them again for six months until when our paths cross in the woods.

People who need people

For the most part, though, people keep coming back. Why? They prefer the group experience.

Think about it. If you’re an active hiker with one of our GetHiking! Meetup groups, there’s likely a corps group you see on most hikes. Then there’s a smaller circle that drops in every month or two, as well as a smattering of newcomers, folks either new to the area or intrigued by a particular hike.

Now, a whole industry has grown to explore, explain and, in some cases, exploit the notion of group dynamics, especially as they apply in the workplace. Self-help shelves teem with books on the subject, group dynamic podcasts abound, speakers on the lecture circuit make beau coup bucks expounding on the topic. But when it comes to hiking, the allure of the group is simple, boiling down to two things:

Peer encouragement. Years ago I helped coach a couch-to-5K program that consisted of about 30 aspiring runners, nearly all women. It was a good approach, trying to ease folks into running by mixing walking with running, more of the former at first, the latter as the program went on. Frankly, as the weather grew warmer this after-work program could be quite grueling. But week after week, nearly everyone showed up, even on those 85/85 days (heat/humidity). Why? Because the other runners were expecting them to be there. Some would call it peer pressure, but that has a negative spin. “Peer encouragement” is more like it. With our hikes, you sign up, you see who else is going to be there (and they see your name as well), you show up.

The social connection. This may be the least touted and studied health benefit of hiking. We’ve known for years that a brisk walk in the woods can lower everything from your blood pressure to your weight. More recently we’ve been reading more about the benefits of simply being outdoors: just standing out in the sun for 5 to 15 minutes two or three days a week can give you an appreciable boost of Vitamin D. But only very recently has our growing sense of isolation — of communicating with one another electronically rather than in person, of the growing number of people in the work-from-home economy — been identified as a threat to our physical and mental health. Hiking in a group is one way to remedy that situation. And our GetHiking! Meetup hikes go a long way toward encouraging a social connection. 

Where’s the wildlife?

Here’s one way I know this is true.

On just about every hike, someone inevitably says, “Why haven’t we seen any wildlife?”

“Because we’re steamrolling through the forest as a jabbering mass,” I’m inclined to say (but do so more tactfully). “The woodland creatures can hear us coming a mile away.”

Other signs: 

• People arrive earlier and earlier for our hikes, eager for that pre-hike conversation.
• On the other end, I’ve had people stay a good 15 to 20 minutes after a hike ends, talking away, in no hurry to leave.
• Our hikers seem to do a lot together outside of our hikes. You’re off Mondays? So am I! Let’s get together for a hike.
• Hikers know more and more about one another’s outside lives. On a recent hike, we spent 10 minutes updating one another on the latest news concerning a fellow hiker’s dog, who had broken her leg.

I think there’s a keen awareness of this phenomenon, of hiking to forge a connection, in the our community. When I moved to the area in the early ‘90s, group hikes tended to be cliquish affairs. The regulars hung together, the newcomers hopefully had other newcomers to hook up with. If not, they often didn’t come back.

Today, newcomers are far more likely to brought into the fold. On a hike last Saturday at Falls Lake, we had the regulars plus a fellow who had hiked with us once, but several years ago. Over the course of the 6-mile hike I noticed him paired and talking with at least three regulars. Will we see him again? It’s a pretty good bet.

Sure, we’re out there for an invigorating walk, to enjoy the stark beauty of the winter woods, to get away from all that’s electronic. But we’re also out there for each other. We need each other. That’s one reason we hike.

The post Another reason we hike appeared first on GetGoing NC!.

When I was in my late 20s, I worked as a technical writer for a military contractor. I liked the work; trouble was, because it was a military contract, there were long stretches where there was no work to be done while we awaited approvals.

Oddly, it was one of the most stressful jobs I’ve had, the stress of having to look busy being much worse than actually being busy. To maintain my sanity, I would take advantage of my lunch hour (a true lunch hour, a corporate relic of the 20th century) and drive to a nearby park where I would read, walk, explore. I’m positive those hour-long escapes allowed me to survive a year of “not working.”

Three decades and I find myself again employing these hour-long escapes to save my sanity from quite the opposite situation. Year-end deadlines, planning for 2017, and dealing with the demands of the holidays all demand that I carve out an hour of mid-day outside time to keep my wits.

 A whole hour!? In the middle of the workday — at this time of year!?!?

It does seem counterintuitive. But think about how you’re often feeling around noon. Sluggish, like you need a nap. Instead, you go out for lunch, after which you feel even more in need of curling up under your desk. How much are you getting done if that’s the case?

Exercise, according to research cited by WebMD.com, is the perfect antidote to fatigue.

“More than 90% of the studies showed the same thing: Sedentary people who completed a regular exercise program reported improved fatigue compared to groups that did not exercise,” researcher Patrick O’Connor tells WebMD. “It’s a very consistent effect.”

Exercise in the outdoors carries with it an extra boost of energy: the positive effects of being outdoors are well documented, from improving your outlook (I’ll never get everything done” to “If I do this and this and this … I might just make it”) to improving focus (“Squirrel!”).

Here’s what I do. First, I called up Google Maps and searched for green spots near my Durham office. I was hoping to not have to drive more than 10 minutes (20 minutes roundtrip, or a third of my allotted hour); as luck would have it, I identified four escapes within 5 minutes of my Durham office: Hollow Rock Nature Park, Sandy Creek Park, Duke’s Al Buehler Cross-Country Trail, and a half dozen access points to Duke Forest off NC 751. Ten minutes of driving, leaving 50 to lose myself in these embedded urban escapes.

Each escape varies. At Al Buehler, I typically run (my 50-minute window allows the luxury of walking when the urge hits). Sandy Creek (located atop an old sewage treatment plant site) is better suited to meandering and getting lost in microscopic observations. Hollow Rock’s mile-and-a-half of trail is perfect for a non-hurried, 50-minute, stop-and-smell-the-whatever-that-is stroll. Duke Forest is yet-to-be-explored: the forest is closed to the public Monday through Friday for deer hunting through Dec. 16.

Not that I’m bound to the above regimens. One day last week I hiked perhaps a quarter of a mile to a large outcrop overlooking New Hope Creek. The sky was mostly blue, and while there was a chill in the air, the sun warmed the exposed the rock. I settled in for a thought-free half hour of watching the creek slowly meander by.

Maybe you can’t carve out an hour every day. If you can only do it once or twice a week, take advantage. Just knowing the life preserve is out there is sometimes enough.

The post Monday, Monday: An hour a day  appeared first on GetGoing NC!.

Today’s 90-Second Escape: First Light

You know it’s cooler first thing in the morning. You know that’s the time to have an adventure this time of year if you want to have an adventure. It all makes sense, except for one thing.

The getting up early part.

Today, we offer incentive to rise and explore with a glimpse into what the outdoor world looks like first thing. Then, so inspired, we invite you to join our GetHiking! Triangle group Wednesday morning at 7:30 for a 4.3-mile hike at Umstead State Park. Learn more about that hike and sign up here.

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The post 90 Second Escape: First Light appeared first on GetGoing NC!.