planner girl / trail chaser / bird watcher
Hudson and I headed out to explore the Francis J. Dean Farm Heritage Trails today, and I have to admit that I vastly underestimated this trail system. Since it’s a historical and nature preserve area, I assumed the trails would be mostly flat and easy. While there certainly were some…
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…
Today, Hudson and I checked off hike number four of eight for the Adirondack Gateway Challenge: Hadley Mountain. I’ll admit, I almost turned around a few times on the drive there. Dark, rain-filled clouds seemed to be following us the entire way, growing larger and more threatening with every mile.…
Technically, I started this challenge when Darby and I hiked Lake Bonita and Lake Ann last July. But after saying goodbye to Darby in October 2025 and welcoming Hudson into our lives in December, I decided to start over so that Hudson and I could both be official finishers. My…
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…
Josh had hiked Chimney Mountain before, and I was excited that he wanted to share it with me. We were planning to camp at Mason Lake with friends that weekend, and decided to tackle this hike on our way there. Hike Report 7/27/2019 The day already felt packed. We had…