Busy Day!!

June 23, 2012 was a very busy day for us. As always it was Jen's birthday, and she's now the big 3-2!! This year today was also a big day for Brooke, as months of dance classes finally came together for her big recital. We thought she did wonderful and looked awfully cute up there in her costume on the big stage at the EAHS' Center For The Performing Arts. How many high schools have one of those? She had two routines, one ballet and one tap and she had the stage for a whole six minutes out of the four hour show so we got to watch A LOT of other dance numbers while waiting for hers. We'll also ordered a $35 dollar tape of the entire show so we'll have her first dance numbers preserved forever, and hopefully she likes watching the older girls do their dances because there's gonna be a lot of them to watch. Against their demands because it was dangerous to the dancers (or because they want to sell you more videos) I recorded her big finish from the ballet number and most of her tap routine, which you can see in the videos below. Fortunately no dancers were injured by my recordings. 


Now to finish the busy day Jen and I are packing up to head to Acadia for a week of camping/summer vacation with her parents and Sophia, which Brooke is very excited about. So for now enjoy the videos, and when we return I'm sure there will be plenty of pictures to share.

Six Husbands, Jefferson, Washington and Boott Spur

This past Sunday Greg and I drove up to meet Ryan and his friend Fuji for a hike. They had camped out and we met them up there, which involved leaving around 5:30 in the morning in order to start at a decent hour. After dropping one car off in Pinkham Notch we drove up the road a bit to the Great Gulf Trail. That was our gateway into the wilderness where we would spend the next 12 hours hiking 15 miles of steep rough trails with ladders, ledges and stunning scenery to the top of New England. The weather was perfect for it but strangely we only passed thirty or so other hikers, which wasn't a bad thing, just strange, considering how nice the weather was.

Greg and Fuji had never hiked Mount Washington before and got a great day for their first climb up the Rockpile. For Ryan it was his 4th trip I believe and for me the 6th time I've done it. The great weather and lack of crowds made it one of the more enjoyable trips too and it was certainly a memorable one. After that we headed down via Boott Spur which was new territory for all of us. On the way there just before Tuckerman Junction I quietly passed my 1000th mile of hiking in the White Mountains, which was a neat little milestone for me. After one last rest on the summit of Boott Spur as the sun sank low we headed back below treeline where Fuji and Greg spotted a moose just off the trail. It was the first one Fuji had ever seen anywhere and just the third I remember seeing on hiking trails. After watching him for a bit we headed down to the car and drove back to the other one for a little cookout before heading home.

It was a long tough day, 15.2 miles with 6150 feet of elevation gain, which makes it our longest one day hike mileage-wise and the second most elevation gain we've ever done in a day, but I didn't even lose any more toenails! Only our winter Presidential traverse had more, with 7000 feet over 10.3 miles on day one, but it was all worth the effort. It was just an awesome hike, there's just no other way to put it. Combine that with great friends and other than spending time with my family there aren't many other ways I'd rather spend a day. If you'd like to see some or even a lot of pictures from the hike you can click right here for a slide show.

Other than that my camera has been strangely quiet for a few weeks. We're headed off on a summer vacation/camping trip the week after next so there should be another big update when we get back but for now that's all.

Memorial Day Camping Trip

This past Memorial Day weekend we took advantage of the long weekend and went camping in Acadia. Last year we went and the weather didn't cooperate. It was foggy, cool and misty all weekend long with temps rarely, if ever, getting above 60. This year we had much better luck with mostly bright sunny warm days and temps topping out at 81 Saturday afternoon. We went for a couple hikes, spent an afternoon at the beach, strolled around town, and toured the island. Mix in campfires, sea glass hunting and even a sunrise for myself and we had a very full weekend. There was a lot that I wanted to do that we didn't get to but as they say there's always next time.

Our girls are a year older, obviously, and Emily is wandering everywhere instead of hanging out in a chair and being held all the time and Brooke is a big 4 year old now who's long legs and energetic personality had no trouble tackling a couple of good hikes and jumping around in the 55 degree water at the beach. This year we had a new addition to our group too. Greg and Anne's baby boy Jonah joined the fun for his first camping trip. Mike and Jess also went with us again, which made for three groups and 9 people total. We had a lot of fun and hopefully we'll be able to do it again next year and make this an annual trip. It's a great place to camp as there's virtually no bugs on the island for some reason, the mountains are perfectly sized for Brooke and there's sandy beaches and a nice town to hang around in too. There's an open invite for anyone who wants to join us. For now there's a bunch of pictures from this years trip plus a few other recent ones here.

Hope you like the pictures. We have a busy summer ahead of us so there will be more soon but that's about it for now.