Category: Adventures
If you’ve packed up your tent until next spring, you might want to reconsider. Winter offers families another season — and another world — to explore through camping. Children may enjoy the wonderfully paradoxical nature of winter camping even more than most adults. It’s cold, but you are warm. There’s the immensity of the world […]
An occupational hazard of writing this blog is that no matter where I go, I think about kids in the outdoors. This past weekend, for example, we attended a wedding in Waitsfield, Vermont. Before we left home, I was mostly concerned that we’d packed our wedding best and knew where we were going. Our first […]
Hidden beneath dirt trails and covered by lush forests and colorful mosses and lichens lies the infrastructure of the Northeast’s best hiking: massive rock formations. Often this foundation goes unnoticed. But in some special spots, the rocks emerge from the earth and tell the story of how our favorite wild places were formed, a story […]
The rap on cross-country skiing is that it’s a sport for grown-ups. Cross-country skiing is hard, a workout — “skiing uphill” instead of downhill. All this hard work makes cross-country skiing unappealing to kids, the story goes, and not worth the hassle of teaching them to balance and glide on skinny skis. In certain communities […]
With a 43 kilometer trail system and assortment of winter activities offered, Great Glen Trails at the base of Mount Washington’s historic Auto Road affords any winter enthusiast the potential for adventure. These rolling routes also provide opportunities for skiers accustomed to backcountry powder or parallel tracks to break into a sprint and try some […]
These two hikes represent New England’s epic best—multi-day trips that offer spectacular scenery, outrageous trails, and eye-popping views. Text excerpted from my book, AMC’s Best Backpacking Trips in New England. Learn more this Thursday, May 27 at 7 p.m.—I’ll be giving a slide show and presentation at REI in Reading, Mass., to highlight favorite trips […]
Itching to start backpacking in the mountains at higher elevations? May trips are perfectly doable—you just need to have realistic expectations about the potential conditions. Learn more in the following post…or learn even more on Thursday, May 27 at 7 p.m. I’ll be giving a slide show and presentation at REI in Reading, Mass., to […]
On Thursday, May 27 at 7 p.m., I’ll be giving a slide show and presentation at REI in Reading, Mass., to highlight favorite trips and photos from my guidebook AMC’s Best Backpacking Trips in New England. (Here’s the REI listing for the show.) In the meantime, I wanted to share some of my favorite early-season […]
We continue our series of posts on favorite winter outings for families with children, featuring recommendations from AMC chapter trip leaders and staff. We started in the White Mountains and moved south to Boston’s western suburbs. Now we hear from Boston Chapter family trips leader Heather Hodgson DePaola with suggestions for winter outings in Boston’s […]
This is the second in a series on best winter walks with children. AMC chapter trip leaders and staff have compiled lists of their favorite winter outings for families. We started in the White Mountains, with suggestions from AMC senior interpretive naturalist Nancy Ritger. Now we move to exploring winter with children in the suburbs […]
You’ve packed the warm clothes, the thermos of hot chocolate and snacks, maybe the snowshoes or cross-country skis, and yourselves. You want a winter outing that doesn’t involve lift tickets or the mall. What to do? AMC chapter trip leaders and staff have compiled lists of their favorite winter outings for families with children. Suggestions […]
Nearly seven decades after the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) built its last bridge and blazed its last trail, recreation enthusiasts are still benefitting. President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal program, aimed to put unemployed men to work, had a lasting impact on recreation. The downhill ski industry in New England was practically created by the […]
The weather in the White Mountains over Labor Day weekend was just about perfect, with cool temperatures and fair weather clouds during the day and a brilliant full moon at night. So far, that’s the same forecast looking forward: perfect hiking weather. As I mentioned in my previous post, over the next two weeks I’ll […]
The Appalachian Trail travels through the Northeast for 1,166 miles, from Harpers Ferry, W. Va., to the summit of Katahdin, in Maine. Along the way, it journeys through profound natural diversity, pauses at mind-bending views, and spans the breadth of Northeast hiking experiences. You may never hike the entire AT, but you can still revel […]