Adirondack Highs

My first day in the Adirondacks was fabulous! Well, other than having to get a last minute hotel room because the low that night was going to be 35. But other than that, everything went smoothly! I started out with a hike to the top of Cascade Mountain. It was not an easy hike! I mean, it wasn’t the hardest hike ever, but 2,000 feet of elevation in 2.4 miles is respectable. The hike itself wasn’t great; it was all just trees. But the view from the top... One guy described it as an “all-you-can-see” buffet because of the 360 views. That’s another thing that made it great- everyone at the summit was so friendly! Like, we were all bonding over this epic view. I took a lot of people’s pictures. But, according to everyone I met, this was like, the BEST hike in the area. They talked about another nice peaks, but said the summits are below the tree line, so all you see is trees.

(I can’t decide which pics I like best, so I’m just going to post a bunch. 😳)

(Looking up at the summit)

(On the summit)

I finished the hike pretty early, so I decided to do what I had planned for the next day- see some waterfalls. 

(Popular cliff jumping spot)

(Roaring Brook- this one wasn’t very large, but it was pretty tall.)

(Looking downstream from Roaring Brook)

When I arrived at the campground, there was a cute guy with a beard hanging out in the office. I was pretty sure we’d talked on the phone the day before, so we chatted for a bit. He’s the manager of that campground (just happened to be off-duty) and told me no less than three times that I should come to his private residence if I needed anything. 

Well. That would indicate some level of interest, right? When this type of thing happens, I always tell myself, “Oh, he’s just being friendly.” And maybe he was! But I figured I’d gauge his interest by changing clothes and putting on some deodorant and walking by on my way to the waterfall. 

Everything went according to plan. He was outside when I walked by. I asked him some questions about the waterfall, and he offered to walk me down there. But first, he sent me back to get more appropriate shoes. (I found this very sweet and thoughtful!) We walked down to the waterfall and he offered to take my picture, and then he pointed out a log where we could sit and talk. On the way to it, we noticed some crazy huge fungus growing out of a tree and he helped me up onto a rock to look and then got up there behind me, totally invading my personal space, and I was like, OMG, I’m living a romance novel. I learned that he’s a certified electrician and is also on the county’s Search and Rescue team. (That is so hot.) He shared some fun and sad stories from that, and then invited me back to his place for a beer. 

He started a fire and we drank our beers and the conversation was great. I kept looking for cues that he wanted me to leave him alone, but he seemed really into the conversation and at one point, ran inside to grab some books about medicinal plants and stuff that he wanted to show me. (I am so into these mountain men who are competent in the outdoors. During our conversation about plants, he took me over to a balsam tree and had me eat some thing from it, and I wanted to just kiss him right then.) 

Sounds like everything was going great, right? Well, after a few hours of hanging out, he says, “Well, I should let you get to your campsite so you can get your fire going.” And I was like, “I don’t do fires when I camp alone,” but I’m not stupid, this was obviously my cue to leave, and he said something about how he needed to make his rounds in the campground and I said something about getting up early the next day and told him to have a good night, and that was it.

What the heck? I mean, I didn’t plan for this to turn into a Dear Penthouse letter, but he could have kissed me. We could have hung out over the weekend. I was just baffled. But, who knows... I am super awkward, so maybe I said something wrong. But it’s not like I told him I shop at Gap Kids, or that I voted for John McCain because he’s white. (These are things that have been said to my friend Debra and I on dates.) 

Whatever. I was out of there by 6:30 the next morning. (Not intentionally... didn’t realize they have world class fly fishing here, so everyone in the campground gets up at 5:30.)