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| Virginia, February 2021 |
The idea of hiking Windham High Peak in the northern Catskills every month of the year was not my initial intention. In early March 2020, I had scheduled an Adirondack Mountain Club (ADK) hike to the Tongue Mountain Range overlooking Lake George in the Adirondacks. I was excited to have a full group of 12 participants but, as the date approached, news of the Coronavirus reaching the United States, then the east coast, and eventually New York City suddenly raised concern.
Carpooling no longer seemed safe. Participants began emailing me that they planned to drive alone to the trailhead. When I remembered that the parking area for the Tongue Mountain hike would only hold about five vehicles, I realized that I needed to come up with a different location.
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| The Three Jims socially distanced, March 2020 |
The large parking lot at Windham High Peak fit the bill. In addition, this mountain is not far from the Albany area and seemed an environmentally conscious option if each car would only include the driver. I knew that many of my participants would decide not to join in such a dramatic change of plans and was not surprised that, of my original group of twelve, just three chose to attend the revised hike.
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| Spring Beauties, May 2020 |
Jim C., Jim G., and Jim O., all men with whom I had hiked many times, were enthusiastic about the new plan. The four of us enjoyed the trail, the camaraderie and the views. We agreed that Windham High Peak had been an excellent alternate hike on a beautiful late-winter day.
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| Looking east towards Albany, June 2020 |
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| Lush forest green, June 2020 |
By April, the Governor encouraged people to stay close to home, which, for me, did not include the Adirondacks. I returned to Windham High Peak because I wanted to hike, knew it had a pretty trail and nice views, and because I wanted to stay in shape for an eventual return to the Adirondacks.
This time I hiked by myself, the safest choice given the spread of the virus. I saw no one on my way up the mountain, but, on my descent, I passed a few small groups making their ascent. I put on my mask and stepped off the trail to let others go by. Most of the other hikers did the same.
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| Mountain Ash, July 2020 |
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| Stinging Nettles, July 2020 |
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| Warm, sultry, and no view, July 2020 |
By June, now my 4th consecutive month on Windham High Peak, I came up with the idea of repeating this hike every month of the year from March 2020 through to February 2021. I dubbed this My Windham High Peak Covid Challenge. I looked forward to watching the seasons change in this particular location. Not only that, the drive from my home was very pleasant as it meandered through beautiful familiar countryside.
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| Sue, August 2020 |
July came and I fought with the weather. Summer, with its heat and humidity, is not my time of year. And there were other annoyances. Where spring beauties had lined the path in May, stinging nettles became a plague in July. I had focused on the presence of ticks but hadn't given nettles a thought when I wore shorts and carefully covered my bare legs with tick spray. My skin was virgin flesh for the nettles.
The sting of stinging nettles lasts 20 or 30 minutes at the most, in my experience, just long enough to be annoying on a warm day during the hike's ascent and back on the descent. In addition, the view was completely socked in and I was getting bored. I decided that I would ask a friend to join me in August, reasoning that two of us driving in two cars and staying socially distant would be safe from the virus and not too environmentally negligent.
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| My favorite hiking companion, daughter Meredith, September 2020 |
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| South-facing view of Blackhead Range, September 2020 |
I delayed my August hike long enough to find a cool day. Barely squeaking the trip in, one of my ADK friends, Sue, joined me on the 31st. Sharing the adventure felt great. To top off the day, as we descended, we saw two other ADK friends heading up. We put our masks on and stopped for a short visit.
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| Deb, October 2020 |
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| Looking north, mixed autumn color, October 2020 |
Windham High Peak boasts three summit overlooks. The south-facing view faces the Blackhead Range of the Northern Catskills. Another rocky outcropping offers a north-facing scene across hills and a valley of farms and small towns to the Adirondacks in the distance. Finally, continuing on the summit trail and after a slight descent, the Hudson Valley and Empire State Plaza in downtown Albany are visible on a clear day to the east. Any of these is a perfect location for a lunch stop.
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| Trisha, November 2020 |
My daughter, Meredith, came up from New Jersey for my September hike. At the mountain summit, her Garman Watch told us that we had hiked the equivalent of 81 flights of stairs!
In October, my friend, Deb, displayed the resilience of the lifelong athlete that she is by hiking with me not long after her meniscus surgery. Trisha, one of the women with whom I camp in the Adirondacks, joined me in November. Karen ended 2020 with me in December and brought Dove chocolates to share...just to keep us going, of course! Having someone with me was fun and just the change I needed.
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| Karen, December 2020 |
Other friends asked if they could accompany me as I began to close in on my year-long challenge, but the virus raged into a double-digit infection rate. I chose to hike alone in January. I basked in the quiet and solitude of winter, saw only three other hikers, and felt far away from the stress and anxiety of life in the valley.
I was thrilled to see a distant cloud inversion or "undercast." Although many people I knew had witnessed far more dramatic undercasts this season while hiking in the Adirondacks and in New Hampshire's White Mountains, I felt fortunate to see one just before the clouds rose and covered the distant mountains.
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| Beautiful snow, southern view, January 2021 |
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| The "bones" of the terrain, January 2021 |
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| Cloud inversion or undercast, January 2021 |
I was excited to complete my "challenge" in February! Even better, Windham had had 25 inches of new snow just the previous week and intermittent lesser storms in the ensuing days. Linda, my friend of more than 40 years, joined me for this very snowy snowshoe outing.
With so much snow, Linda and I were glad to find that other hikers had broken the trail and made a nice track in recent days. Additional powder snow fell gently during our entire ascent, adding a fluffy coating to already perfect conditions. While Linda and I both agreed that snowshoeing is harder for us than hiking on a dirt path, we were grateful for the reprieve from dodging roots and rocks that the depth of the snow provided.
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| A deep and nicely broken snowshoe trail, February 2021 |
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| Linda, February 2021 |
We were taken with the pristine beauty and silence of deep winter. Boulders appeared nearly submerged by feet of snow, trail markers seemed low on their posts, white mounds blanketed stone walls, and mountain views shown through the leafless forest. What a fabulous ending to my year spent hiking this Catskill peak.
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| Light snow to the south in this iconic view, February 2021 |
What have I learned during My Windham High Peak Covid Challenge? I loved knowing that I had a pre-determined place to hike, whenever I could get there at some point each month. I learned that, even if I began the hike with a sluggish pace, I always became energized in the process. While I like to hike alone, I discovered that my own company gets tiresome. I became familiar with specific trees, rocks, roots underfoot and the ever-changing trail from its beginning crossing the Batavia Kill to the summit plateau. Windham High Peak now holds a special place in my hiking history.
