Here's the third in my series of Hiking Notes -- thinking about what happens to my writing mind when I take to the trail.
The Snow Hole, a popular hiker's destination in the Berkshires, located almost exactly at the intersection of New York, Massachusetts and Vermont, is located atop and within the Taconic crest, which I've been writing about for the past two days.
I heard about the Snow Hole as soon as I moved to the Berkshires. Accounts were vague: there's a crevasse up in the mountains where it stays cold enough to keep snow frozen even through the summer. Like the natural marble bridge in North Adams, the Snow Hole has been a tourist sight for over 200 years. At both places you can see carved graffiti from the 19th century. Part geographical oddity, part kitsch. During the years I had small kids, such an outing was impossible. Then, my kids got older and developed interests other than hiking. Then, I forgot.
The Snow Hole popped back on my radar when I started hiking a few years ago. Last spring, I looked at the map of trails I had yet to hike, and singled out this one. Since then, I've gone twice. With breaks, plus some steep meandering on logging road off-shoots, it took me 3 hours. Some trail guides describe the hike as easy to moderate, but yesterday, after the 7-mile there-and-back, I was spent.
I said I've hiked to the Snow Hole two times. But I've only seen it once. Today, I'm writing about what I saw when I didn't see the Snow Hole, the first time around. Tomorrow, I'll write about what I saw when I did see it. And about how both the seeing and the not seeing fire the impulses that give rise to writing -- to poetry, especially.
The first hike to the Snow Hole was a radiant experience. It was mid-March, cold and crystal-clear, not yet even early spring. There was snow along the trail, but not enough for snowshoes. Microspikes were all I needed.
After the initial, steep ascent, we gained the ridge where the trail begins to level out. The guidebook says "undulating hills," but that description softens the fairly constant burn in lungs, glutes and tendons. While I was aware of my pace, pulse and breath, the dogs bounded through the woods -- two German shepherd puppies, the one about six months old, the other, almost two. At top speed, they made enormous loops and figure 8's, crossing the trail to tag me as they careened by. Part gazelle, the younger one pronked, catching as much air as she covered ground. The older one, almost 90 lbs, followed her as best he could, crashing through the brush and hurtling the fallen trees he couldn't squeeze under. Nonhumans and human, we moved forward, loosely together, but at wildly different paces, over and along opposing planes and axes.
The trail is densely wooded along the ridge. But in March, which is still stick season in the Berkshires, you can see distant ranges to both west and east. A couple of miles along, things open up and you come to a meadow and to the first of three, all-season vista points that give a glorious, 180 degree view to the south and west. Mountains, hills, farms, settlements. You can see past Petersburg, NY, almost to Albany, 45 miles away.
Then it's back into the woods. Signage tells you when you're under a mile from the Snow Hole. When you arrive, there's another small sign with two arrows, indicating a spur trail that takes you away from and loops you back to the main trail. I know this now, but that day I only saw a single arrow. The dogs followed me as I turned to the right, open, expectant, but not at all sure what I was looking for.
Descending slightly for a few hundred feet, we came to a depression to the right of the trail, 40' long, 20' wide. A few large boulders marked either side. Could this be it? More hollow than crevasse or cleft. True, it was lined with snow, but so was the rest of the ridge that day. No big whup. We looked down into whatever it was, two of us clambered in and rolled around in the snow, then we doubled back to the main trail, and headed home.
The anticlimax didn't dampen my euphoria. This was one of my longest hikes yet -- 6 miles, 850' elevation gain. I had reached my farthest point north on the Taconic crest--a personal best. Another trail to highlight on the map.
Tomorrow -- the sequel, the real thing, "a missing that collapses into an addendum" (Ann Lauterbach).
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