Monadnock

S. and I celebrated Memorial Day weekend with a short trip through Central Massachusetts and Southern New Hampshire. A couple of S’s friends live in a yurt just outside of Petersham with their naked 2.5-year old. It’s a very happy household and I have a new appreciation for circular living spaces — the Oval Office makes a lot more sense now.

After breakfast and a chat ranging from zoning restrictions to home fermentation to computer graphics, S. and I set off for Mount Monadnock. Monadnock is an anomolous blip in the largely flat terrain between the Berkshires and the White Mountains. At 3,165 feet its barren summit surveys an impressive green swath of middle-of-nowhwere New Hampshire.

The traditional Monadnock route follows the White Dot Trail up steep, granite-strewn terrain for 1.9 miles and then descends via the more gradual White Cross Trail for another 2.0 miles. This is without a doubt one of the finest short hikes I’ve enjoyed. S. and I made the round trip in three hours with leisurely stops to stuff our eyeballs with the summit view and our bellies with a picnic lunch. I gather that when the weather is nicer Monadnock might see an unwieldy number of visitors, but conditions were cruddy — ahem, excitingly cold and windy — enough to keep the crowds at bay. As proof, I submit the following video. The audio is ever-so-slightly obscured, so I’ve provided a transcript below:

Transcript:
K: Can we sing the Monadnock song now?!
S: OK!
K&S: [Musical rendition of Monadnock song]
K: Are you having fun?!
S: Yes!

Apologies to the Muppets and Emerson, but I think it’s pretty nice.