planner girl / trail chaser / bird watcher
I had the day off from work today, and I’ve been trying to make a point of hiking with Hudson whenever my days off don’t line up with Josh’s. My original plan was to hike O.K. Slip Falls, but while catching up on old blog posts and hiking journals the…
Darby is now an almost 6 year old chocolate lab. She has been our wild mountain biking dog since 4 months old… sadly she’s got some arthritis issues that we’ve been working through – so biking is on the back burner (for now)…. Enter her HIKING era… This is our…
This post was updated on 6/19/2026. I first came across the 4-3-2-1 Way Hiking Challenge back in 2017 and figured it would be a breeze to complete. After all, it only requires ten hikes total. Then life happened. Eight years later, I’m close—but still not quite finished. The challenge requires…
I had originally planned for the Indian River/Hudson River Confluence Trail to be the final hike of the day. Nature, however, had other plans. When we arrived, the road was completely blocked by a massive downed tree. Rather than add extra mileage by hiking the road, I pulled up the…
Hike #3 of the day turned out to be the redemption I needed after our less-than-successful attempt at Rock Lake. Feeling a little intimidated after turning around earlier, I was happy to arrive at this beautiful and peaceful destination. Hike Report The hike to Sprague Pond is incredibly short—less than…
Rock Lake was hike number two of the day. Conveniently, the trailhead is located just down Route 28 from Sawyer Mountain, making it an easy addition to our itinerary. Hike Report This is a very short and relatively easy hike, following Johnny Mack Brook for much of the route before…
Today we had big plans to complete several hikes in the Indian Lake area. Since I’m getting close to completing the 4-3-2-1 Way Challenge, and Darby had already completed some of the hikes with me, I decided to focus on a few of the remaining trails so she could potentially…
This weekend, we went canoe camping on Blue Mountain Lake. While researching the area before our trip, I was excited to discover that Castle Rock could be accessed directly from the lake. Since we were already camping by canoe, it was just a short paddle farther to reach the trailhead.…
Because I love hiking challenges, and because I once got Josh to agree to do the Fire Tower Challenge with me, we were able to squeeze Blue Mountain into our weekend while camping at Mason Lake. I was really excited for this one. I’ve driven by Blue Mountain countless times,…
Snowy Mountain is no joke. And please, for the love of all that is good, do not believe the guidebooks when they tell you it’s only three miles to the summit. Three miles? Maybe if you’re measuring as the crow flies. In reality, it felt much closer to four and…