During my most recent trip to Vermont, I was lucky enough to experience the beautiful New England foliage at its peak. And it was so so so pretty. My dad told me that the old ladies come up by the bus load just to see the leaves and now I understand why!
On the Saturday after we arrived, we decided to hike to Killington peak. Killington, an awesome ski mountain, is conveniently located near my house in VT. I’ve been going to for almost 15 years now, so it has become a large part of my life! Every winter I get to experience breath-taking views from the peak and I wanted to experience this awesomeness during the fall! Plus, the Catwalk (a higher hiking area that leads to the very, very peak) is always closed in the winter, so this was my chance to get up there before the snow.
Ray and I set off for the hike, but first stopped at an information desk to inquire the best route. The kind employee informed us that there were three different ways to reach the peak:
OPTION 1: We could pay $30 to take the gondola up...LAME.
OPTION 2: We could hike up taking a series of green trails (easy).
OPTION 3: We could hike directly under the gondola on a double black diamond trail (very difficult).
Hmmm…. the logical conclusion for any normal human would be option 2. Save money, take a nice hike, get to the top. BOOM, DONE!
That’s not what we decided. NOPE! Bright eyed and bushy-tailed Courtney and Raymond chose option 3, not realizing they were choosing a dark fate.
We started the trek and not even 20 mins in we realized this wasn’t a hike, this was hell. It was nothing like the glorious hikes I’ve written about before. There were no winding, tree filled trails. No boulders to jump around on or creeks to cross. This was like walking up a very, very steep field for 5 MILES! We climbed a total elevation of 4,229 ft at a 29 degree angle. Not fun.
After a while, we stopped and collapsed to the ground, exhausted and covered in sweat. Pour Ray wore, jeans. Jeans were a bad choice! We considered turning back, but after looking on the GPS we discovered that we were halfway there. We had to continue.
So we did. What made this hike worse was that the people riding up on the gondola above us we’re clearing making fun of us, basking in our pain. Meanies!!!
An hour and a half later we finally arrived at the top (this was pretty quick b/c we wanted to get it over with). Sweaty and noodle legged, we took the final climb up the Catwalk. This part of the hike was actually awesome.
The trees were the darkest shade of green I’d ever seen and we got to weave in this cool windy trail to the tippy top of the mountain. We emerged from the trees onto a giant rock and low and behold; we were in a cloud.
This meant that we had 0% chance of seeing the glorious view we hiked up here to see.
You’re killin' me, smalls!
At this point, Ray and I were too exhausted to be overly disappointed. Instead we channeled what little energy we had into sneaking onto the gondola for a free ride down.
SUCCESS! We got on without anyone noticing AND we had the gondola all to ourselves. Luckily, we also got to see the beautiful view, that I had wanted, as we emerged from the cloud and made our way down the mountain. YAY!
Overall, I rate this hike a 1/10, but I’m proud of Ray and I for completing this quest. We learned our lesson; next time, we are checking the weather first and taking OPTION 2.
Hey, at least we saved $30.
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