A Walk in the Woods...

View from the top of Wachusett Mountain

Long weekends are amazing, there's no arguing with that. I absolutely love them. I had a really long weekend, because I only work four days a week.

This weekend, the weather has been amazing, so we decided to get outside and play!  Saturday morning, we took a little road trip and went out to Wachusett Mountain to do some walking and hiking. When we arrived, we were told by two separate rangers that there was a bear sighting in the area! They told us where the bear was seen first, and again, and it was determined that it was both far enough from where we were walking and walking further away, that we didn't have anything to worry about. 

 

 

Lake at the Summit

We started off on the Bicentennial Trail, which is a short, 1 mile loop that leads away from the parking area and visitors center.  We quickly transitioned to the Pine Hill Trail, which led up to the Summit.  The terrain was rocky and steep, but a lot of fun to climb.  We were both sweating buckets and short of breath, but it was a great workout and a great way to spend the day outside. 

Zoom! The rest of a ski run!

Because the way up was so steep, we thought we'd pick a different way down. We picked the Old Indian Trail down from the summit, and quickly found that there was no easy way to get down mountain.  We jumped and skipped and balanced on big rocks, small rocks, roots and logs as we made our way down.  It was a nice workout for the abs and arms as well as our legs! All of that balancing made the workout just as good on the way down as the way up! When we hit the road, we took that back to the car, as our legs (after two hours of going up, then down the mountain) were looking for a little rest!  We ended up walking through some of the ski runs! Who knew that during the summer months, there are perfectly paved roads that cut right through them!

Overall, it was a really fun morning!  One of our goals has been to get out to the hundreds of parks and trails that are close to us.  It's a great way to not only get some fresh air and exercise, but it's pretty much free!  (That's going to become more and more important as I'm back in school and we lose a chunk of our income!)