Episode 137 - All Trails Challenge/Lesser Know Trails with Sarah Bacon

[00:00:00] Well, I have been focusing on the Catskills a little more because of the All Trails Challenge.

[00:00:06] I love the Adirondacks. I think... I mean, I love hiking. I would go... I don't think I've met a mountain

[00:00:13] that I don't like. But as much as I love the Adirondacks, there is something so special

[00:00:19] about the Catskills for me. There have been so many magical moments in the Catskills

[00:00:25] that just... I don't know. I hate to sound cheesy, but the more I hike the Catskills,

[00:00:33] the more I believe in magic. And I don't know how else to say it. There's just something special

[00:00:37] to me about those woods and the trails. And I don't know. I think people who hike the Catskills

[00:00:46] understand that. Yeah. I gotta admit there is a whole different vibe down here in the Catskills

[00:00:52] with the people that you meet and stuff like that. It seems like people in the Catskills are

[00:00:59] more out there for nature and more out there for their experience than to get the peace.

[00:01:04] I mean, that's what I see. The Bushwax were some of the worst days I've ever had in the mountains

[00:01:19] or life, really. Whereas Pants and Mountains is totally opposite to the mountain on top of a cave.

[00:01:27] I think the weather challenges on this incident were particularly difficult.

[00:01:33] It is really the development of New York State. Catskills were the responsiveness.

[00:01:44] Now you're listening to Inside the Line, the Catskill Mountains podcast.

[00:01:55] Yeah, yeah. I don't know. Sarah, I didn't think you'd had the time. You're not into

[00:02:00] this podcast, are you? What do you mean? I love this podcast. It's my favorite podcast.

[00:02:05] Come on. She's an official sponsor. Of course we are.

[00:02:09] Did that sound... Let me redo that. Did that sound authentic? This is my favorite podcast.

[00:02:15] A little more... Try it again. Try it a little more emphasis on favorite.

[00:02:20] This is my favorite podcast. Good. That's good.

[00:02:25] Let's roll from the top now. All right. So tonight, 137,

[00:02:31] Sarah Bacon is here to talk about the All Charles Challenge that she is just about to complete.

[00:02:36] She only has what? Like not even six miles left, right? No, yeah. Half of that left.

[00:02:42] Yeah. So three miles. We're not going to say what you have left, right? Because it's...

[00:02:47] You don't want people, weird people to join in on, right? That's what you said to me.

[00:02:53] No, I don't want to tell you when. I can tell you where. It's Red Hill.

[00:02:57] Oh, nice. I've done Dinch Road, obviously. But yeah, the new trail for Red Hill. I'm

[00:03:05] excited to check it out. Excellent. Excellent. So she's going to talk about the All trails

[00:03:09] tonight and we're going to talk about some other stuff as well. So have you guys ever heard

[00:03:16] of the Havasupi Reservation, the Havasupi Falls and stuff like that? North or northwestern Arizona

[00:03:25] with the Grand Canyon? Yes. Tad of you? I have. Yeah. So beautiful place, cascading waterfalls.

[00:03:35] Absolutely studying. Jessica and I a couple of years ago had... I actually got reservations for

[00:03:41] that place, but the timing wasn't correct and we just couldn't go. So we gave it up and I was

[00:03:48] looking forward to it. As in, that was the time when it was actually pretty cheap to go there. Now

[00:03:54] it's actually very expensive. I didn't get reservations this year, but it was just absolutely

[00:03:59] astronomical to just tent there. It was over $500 and I was like, no, that's three days.

[00:04:05] Three days, two nights. Do they supply you with a tent at least?

[00:04:09] Yeah, right. Wouldn't that be nice? So the 500 does not include a tent. It's just three nights,

[00:04:16] bring your own tent, bring your own gear. Yep. With a 13 mile trip into where you're staying.

[00:04:24] So that's pretty expensive real estate if it's $500 for three nights and it's what,

[00:04:29] like a four by eight tent space that you're covering. It's not bad.

[00:04:34] It's... Well, you make more money than I do then because damn, that's a lot.

[00:04:40] Sarah, do you agree with me? That's a lot for four by eight, 500 bucks.

[00:04:46] You know what? Location, location, location, right? You're paying for us,

[00:04:50] paying for the location I'm imagining. I would want someone to at least

[00:04:54] hack my stuff in for me. Right? Sounds like a not ever a shit, you know?

[00:04:59] Yeah. But it's like what Sarah said, it is location, location, location. The waterfalls

[00:05:07] are stunning. You're right next to a creek that has... I forgot what kind of stone it is,

[00:05:11] but it makes it kind of like a bluish color. So this recently, the past week,

[00:05:19] there was some massive flooding that happened and a lot of people don't know that if there is

[00:05:25] rain 20 miles north of the Grand Canyon or stuff, that massive amount of rain,

[00:05:31] it'll flood into the Grand Canyon to make the Grand Canyon absolutely insane.

[00:05:35] And that is what happened is that a way and in an approach south towards to where the

[00:05:42] Havasupi is, that it made this place absolutely insane and that the waterfalls that were bluish

[00:05:49] turned into a dark brown floods everywhere. People were stranded, hundreds were stranded

[00:05:57] inside of this Havasupi reservation. And once again, the only way in is by either backpacking 13 miles

[00:06:05] in and then flying out by helicopter or you go 13 miles in, 13 miles out. So all these people,

[00:06:12] hundreds of people had to be transported out by helicopter because they were stranded.

[00:06:17] And unfortunately, found out later today that one person lost their life due to the flooding.

[00:06:23] And as I've said before, flooding, everybody talks about hurricanes, tornadoes, stuff like that.

[00:06:31] Flooding is one of the most destructive forces of nature that you cannot stop,

[00:06:36] that you cannot predict and that flash flooding just destroys everything.

[00:06:42] And it's just a tragic time. And with hiking, you kind of think with this area that it's

[00:06:50] absolutely insane. Yeah. Well, most folks don't associate hiking with water sports.

[00:06:58] So they're not equipped for fast rising, forceful currents and they're just not

[00:07:07] prepared for that. Any thoughts, Sarah? Yeah, no, it's interesting that you say that just

[00:07:13] even in our area, not thinking ahead of what's to come on a day that maybe there's

[00:07:21] going to be a lot of rain in the afternoon or in spring when there's melt and the runoff,

[00:07:27] you know, you cross a stream in the morning and by afternoon, it's a completely different

[00:07:32] situation. So, obviously not to the same level that we're talking about. But yeah,

[00:07:39] you're right. People think they're going to go out for a hike. They're not considering

[00:07:42] that they may have to swim for it. Correct. Well, that's why having

[00:07:46] some local knowledge from maybe a local guide is a good idea. Just throwing that out there.

[00:07:53] An idea. Yeah. Maybe you should do some guiding out in the Havasupi area.

[00:08:00] If you can afford the real estate. Right. And if you've seen the stuff, I've kind of attached

[00:08:09] that to my Instagram page because once again, I've been following the Havasupi for years upon

[00:08:14] years wanting to get a reservation and to go down there because it's just absolutely phenomenal,

[00:08:20] but it just hasn't been right. And these floods are absolutely insane that people,

[00:08:26] you can see that they're located in the canyons and usually they have one or two waterfalls

[00:08:31] and there's like six around them just because of the canyons flooding full of water.

[00:08:37] So, can you imagine if you're a family, husband, wife,

[00:08:41] two, three young children under the age of 14 each? And that's your vacation. You've

[00:08:47] been looking forward to doing this not just for months, but maybe a year, year and a half or two.

[00:08:53] You go out there and then you're caught in these rising waters, your family, everybody's vulnerable.

[00:09:02] And you just thought it was going to be a fun time camp.

[00:09:06] And it's a helicopter rescue that takes you out. I mean, it's an experience you want to

[00:09:10] chat about, but it's pretty scary as heck. Yeah. Unless you're the family of that

[00:09:15] one woman who didn't survive, right? Yeah. That's sad.

[00:09:19] Unfortunate. Grateful that there was over 100 people that were rescued and survived. So,

[00:09:25] grateful that that happened. And people were smart enough because I've heard that this area

[00:09:30] can be just like Catterstale Falls area that people don't prepare to hike 13 miles in and

[00:09:36] spend three days at a reservation doing their own thing on hiking.

[00:09:41] You know, it's just I'm very, and that's when I talk about social media kind of helps out

[00:09:48] with this situation because a lot, you know, there's a lot of social media pages that I follow

[00:09:52] with the Habasupia and they do awesome recommendations on what gear to have, what food to have,

[00:09:59] like, you know, other stuff. It's actually phenomenal.

[00:10:04] Yeah. Well, we hope everybody was prepared, but kudos to those volunteers that stepped in and,

[00:10:09] you know, put together that evacuation effort that must have been quite an undertaking.

[00:10:15] Yeah, definitely. Helicopter rescues and stuff like that all done by the reservation and not done

[00:10:20] by like any of the the LQUS Coast Guard and stuff like that and National Forest National Services

[00:10:27] stuff like that all done by the reservation. So amazing job. No, I was going to ask is there

[00:10:31] any word on how the locals are doing out there if they've gotten that much rain?

[00:10:37] You know, how are they doing? So it has been closed indefinitely. And that area, the Habasupia

[00:10:46] area going down into that area is basically the only way they survive is off of us white people.

[00:10:55] The tourism. Yeah, well, it's too bad. So they've had this happen before.

[00:11:01] And they've recovered. It's taken a long time. You know, I remember, you know, a couple years ago

[00:11:07] when they had this similar incident and it knocked them off their feet like COVID and

[00:11:12] stuff like that, but they've recovered. And so I'm willing to go back there again,

[00:11:18] not again, I'm willing to go back there. Greg Calabrese went there and tried to chat

[00:11:24] about his time there. And he said it was one of the lifetime experience. And, you know,

[00:11:29] if they lower the prices, maybe I'll be, you know, thoughtful of what they do.

[00:11:36] Onto the next topic. So a while back, I don't even remember what this episode was.

[00:11:42] I talked about Woodstock having a zine of a development come along. So this area is

[00:11:49] outside of the Bluestone area of Woodstock. We're looking kind of to the east of Woodstock

[00:11:55] outside of the escarpment trail. And they were going to take a huge area and make it into a

[00:12:02] area full of development golf courses, stuff like that. You know, I consider this kind of rich

[00:12:09] people stuff, but they said it would be available to, to development for, you know,

[00:12:16] people who couldn't afford housing and stuff. And they had a recent

[00:12:21] meeting in Woodstock on August 22nd. And I don't think it went well for Zina. A lot of people,

[00:12:29] of course, were against it in the Woodstock area. And, you know, a lot of I heard that the whole

[00:12:36] town court was overfilled. People were outside listening. They had speakers like on the outside

[00:12:44] projecting what, what people were saying. So and, you know, it was, it was a very interesting

[00:12:52] article to read about. And, you know, Ted, you're kind of familiar with this more than I am, correct?

[00:13:00] Well, I'm not familiar with this project and the details of this project, but

[00:13:06] I have an interest in land development, zoning and conservation. And this is an instance where

[00:13:16] mobilizing the locals to organize and put forth an effort to defend their community is important.

[00:13:26] And hope, and I saw that the local opposition does have a web page. They appear to have a

[00:13:33] high level of organization that they're marshaling their local talent to oppose this application.

[00:13:40] Because one of the things you have when a developer comes into a community like this,

[00:13:45] that developer has the backing and funding of investors and they can pump hundreds of thousands

[00:13:53] of dollars into hiring consultants, lawyers, putting together analysis to come up with

[00:14:00] favorable conclusions for the development claiming that there's going to be no

[00:14:06] adverse environmental impacts, etc., etc. And then the municipality is caught, you know,

[00:14:14] with a limited budget. They haven't budgeted in advance, presumably for somebody coming in and

[00:14:20] trying to do this large scale development. So having a local body that can mobilize itself

[00:14:27] and put together a meaningful opposition is a good thing. And it's part of being an American

[00:14:34] and participating in your local government is being able to do something like this. So

[00:14:39] best of fortune to the locals who are fighting for their home turf. And while the

[00:14:45] wise and sound development is a necessity, people need a place to call home on the one

[00:14:50] hand. On the other hand, you know, to the extent that this development fills or doesn't

[00:14:56] fill that need, it just might be all luxury second homes that soaks up

[00:15:04] area available for your local workforce and your local volunteers. I mean, one of the problems we

[00:15:10] have in the Hudson Valley, especially the lower Hudson Valley is so many of the people that live

[00:15:17] here have to work downstate to afford their homes that during the day when there's a call

[00:15:23] for a volunteer fire response or volunteer ambulance response, those volunteers are working

[00:15:31] over an hour away. So it's during the day that we need a lot of cross department cross district

[00:15:38] support. It's a growing problem and eventually people are going to find themselves having

[00:15:43] to pay for professional responders. Yeah, there you go. That's my two cents. Maybe I gave

[00:15:50] you a nickel's worth, but that's it. No, no. Well, no. So the initial plan was 625 acres,

[00:15:58] mostly in Woodstock and more than 190 homes and 18 pro level golf course that include the helipad.

[00:16:05] So now it has been downscaled to 100 acres, 106 acres to be exact. And just, you know,

[00:16:15] Woodstock is fighting tooth and nail about this and it's been a long going process,

[00:16:20] as it always is, you know, with this kind of stuff. Yeah. Well, when you say it's been downsized from

[00:16:26] 625 acres to 100, it's not as if that other 525 acres goes away. That's just open for development

[00:16:37] at some later date. So often you get these developers that come in, they'll downsize their

[00:16:42] project to get their foot in the door. And then after the first phase sells out,

[00:16:50] then they'll come in and look to develop the second phase, the third phase.

[00:16:54] No. Yeah. Sarah, where are you located? Where do you live?

[00:16:59] I'm near Saratoga. And it's interesting because we do see a lot of that in the Saratoga area.

[00:17:07] I had family who lived their whole lives in Saratoga and, you know, over the years,

[00:17:13] there's been a lot of higher end apartment buildings going in where just, you know,

[00:17:20] you're looking at thousands of dollars a month rent. And it's, a lot of people feel like

[00:17:25] they're being squeezed out of the area because housing is just un-bordable.

[00:17:30] Yeah. So I kind of can sympathize with the people of Woodstock. It's a little scary when

[00:17:35] developers want to come in and they have all these grandiose ideas for your community. And it

[00:17:42] sounds good on paper, but like you said, once the foot is in the door, where does it go from there?

[00:17:47] Yeah. And often these projects aren't being developed for the existing local population

[00:17:52] that, like I said, makes up your volunteer workforce, makes up your workforce that's

[00:17:58] working cafe jobs, coffee shop jobs, local business jobs, you know, people that are getting paid at

[00:18:05] or just above minimum wage. It's hard for them to afford for a two-bedroom home like it is,

[00:18:11] or apartment in the Hudson Valley. You can spend $2,000 a month plus utilities for a

[00:18:16] two-bedroom place. And then, gee, maybe you want health insurance because that's kind of a good idea.

[00:18:23] A car to get around from, because no matter where you live in the Hudson Valley or 20 minutes or

[00:18:27] more from where you want to be, so you need a car, you need auto insurance. And it's,

[00:18:33] you know, it's a shame that people work two jobs just to get these basic necessities. And

[00:18:41] so for them going out and renting a tent site, you know, in the Grand Canyon or in a canyon out west

[00:18:50] or just go hiking someplace, it's quite a luxury for them that they have a hard time

[00:18:56] affording. So it's nuts. Good point. Yeah. You know, I like to do this stuff because

[00:19:02] it gets people educated on what's happening somewhat inside the Catskills, outside of

[00:19:08] the Catskills and might, you know, bring attention to it. And it's reopening again,

[00:19:15] September 26th at 7 p.m. at a much larger venue at Mescal Hornbeck Community Center at 56 Rock City

[00:19:22] Road in some place. I'm pretty sure it's Hornbeck, but, and as you can see, the first time

[00:19:29] wasn't as big as they thought it would be. And it's happened, it's exploded. And who knows

[00:19:37] where it goes from here. Well, we'll see. We've seen this stuff happen before, of course,

[00:19:41] in Wyndham and Hunter and stuff, and it's been rejected. So kudos to the people of Woodstock

[00:19:48] sticking up for the Catskills and making this kind of like a place that is rock solid and

[00:19:53] we'll keep it in. But we'll see where it goes from here. I'll keep you, I'll keep everybody

[00:19:57] updated, you know? Keep us posted. Hell yeah. So the one thing I wanted to talk about that

[00:20:03] was actually really, really funny. Well, hold on. So a search and rescue team accidentally finds Jay

[00:20:12] Leno while looking for a missing hiker in California. Well, just, you know, I mean,

[00:20:17] they say they found Jay Leno. It implies that Jay was lost. I didn't realize that he was lost.

[00:20:23] It's hard to list that shown. I know, right? Yeah. And those vehicles that he has,

[00:20:28] he's freaking riding around $700,000 vehicles all the time. Or more. Yeah, right? So a search team

[00:20:35] looking for a missing hiker in the Angeles National Forest, Southern California, stumbled upon an

[00:20:41] unexpected surprise when they encountered none other than Jay Leno. Thankfully,

[00:20:46] they located their missing person later on. So later on in St. Dimas, St. Dimas Mountain Rescue

[00:20:53] team explained that on August 17th, a very fit and experienced 78 year old hiker identified that

[00:21:02] Mr. Yang had gone without a group hiking expedition on the summit of Mount Waterman just outside of

[00:21:08] Los Angeles. However, when the rest of the party returned to the parking lot, they realized he

[00:21:13] was no longer with the group. Now that's one thing I'm trying to comprehend that

[00:21:18] you no longer know that somebody outside of your group is not with your group,

[00:21:23] you know, a couple hours later. So he was more missing reporter about 3 p.m. Search and Rescue

[00:21:29] team suited up looking for him practically everywhere for the next 12 hours. And they found

[00:21:35] Jay Leno, unfortunately on the rendezvous area drive, which was not where they were looking

[00:21:44] for the missing hiker, but where they turned up outside of the trail. So they posted photos

[00:21:49] immediately, of course, instead of going out of photos of Jay Leno. Correct. That's what I'm saying.

[00:21:57] Yeah, that's that's that's the amazing thing I'll post this in the

[00:22:01] notes. But there was a happy ending finally after about eight hours of searching after they

[00:22:08] saw Jay Leno with help from local hikers, which seems to be the thing that's happened again

[00:22:13] once again, social media kind of plays a good role in this. Mr. Yang was in good health but dehydrated

[00:22:20] all told that he spent about 30 hours in the wilderness and was airlifted to safety and reunited

[00:22:25] with his family. Now, Sarah, one of the most important things when guiding and with being

[00:22:33] with a group of people is what can you give your thoughts? Yeah, staying together. I you hear

[00:22:39] this so often people. I don't understand how you can realize two hours later that someone in your

[00:22:46] party is missing unless you've purposely separated or just haven't tried to stick together. That drives

[00:22:54] me crazy. 100%. And we've had this happen a couple times in the Catskills. It happens a lot,

[00:23:02] probably a lot more than a couple times. I've heard horror stories. Yeah. And you know,

[00:23:07] there was that incident on the Big Indian where I think it was like Hudson Valley hikers. They have

[00:23:15] like a kind of like an agreement of you're responsible for yourself and such, but they left

[00:23:21] someone on the top of Big Indian and they went over to fur went back down and they were missing.

[00:23:26] Yeah. It was crazy. And the person was found like a day later down on the

[00:23:31] lean to and it was just it was absolutely insane. And I just don't understand,

[00:23:36] you know, I'm hiking with anybody and everybody I do it's a hike your own hike, but I hike

[00:23:43] those person's hikes. I kind of hike what they want to hike would make them comfortable.

[00:23:49] Yeah. When I hike with a group, I don't mind being the sweet person.

[00:23:53] Yeah. You know, I'll take up through somebody else out front leading, you know,

[00:23:58] calling out the way. I don't mind stepping to the back of the line making sure everybody

[00:24:02] stays together. Nobody drops off the tail end. And it's also, it's good because often the person

[00:24:08] in the back they're struggling, they're struggling, they're huffing, they're puffing and

[00:24:12] they don't hear the sudden approach of the mountain lion coming through the woods towards them.

[00:24:17] So if you're back and if you know what to do, you're able to pivot, turn

[00:24:22] and protect them in that final moment is the mountain lion is, you know,

[00:24:27] lunging towards them out of the field of nettles. Right? Just saying.

[00:24:33] And you're going to find a slow person with you at all times because everybody knows the best way

[00:24:38] to avoid a mountain lion attack is to be the fastest runner in your group.

[00:24:42] Survival of the fittest, it's basic Darwinism.

[00:24:45] Yes. Yeah.

[00:24:47] And if you leave your slow people behind, what do you have? You have nothing?

[00:24:51] Yeah. Well, eventually the mountain lions will catch up with the fit people

[00:24:55] after they off the slower people. So it's better, yeah, it's better to have a few sacrificial

[00:25:00] slow people. That's why when I'm going to hike with the group, I bring Stosh along,

[00:25:05] try to stay close to him. The mountain lion approaches, I just kind of yell out,

[00:25:10] hey, do anything you want to stosh, leave me alone. And then I run away. It works.

[00:25:16] But I have that Swiss army knife that I can like, ah, and then stab it into its necks and

[00:25:21] then just like you're done. Is that the one with the cork screw?

[00:25:25] Yes, it is. Yeah. That's a whole 10 essentials is the Swiss army knife.

[00:25:30] Yeah. Well, because there's 10 things on the Swiss army knife.

[00:25:34] One is an essential for something. Exactly. What do you do with the knife?

[00:25:39] How do you cut your cheese after you've stabbed a mountain lion with it?

[00:25:44] That's the best time to cut the cheese. What do you mean? How do you cut your cheese?

[00:25:47] Now you can relax. Now that you know that you've slain the mountain lion,

[00:25:52] right? And it's not going to be coming after you. You can sit back, put your back up against

[00:25:57] the nearest hemlock, unfold your cheese in front of you and take some nice slices of it, maybe have

[00:26:03] some Gatorade or wine or Stosh would have a cider or two. And you can relax. You can enjoy the

[00:26:10] hike. But do you use the same knife? Do you have to have a separate knife? It feels like

[00:26:15] there's cross contamination. Wow. I'm surprised. Yeah. I mean, I thought you were a cat skill

[00:26:21] hiker. I thought you would have known all about this. I don't know. I just, I can't get behind that.

[00:26:28] Ted, she teaches wilderness first aid. She knows all about this stuff. So she's

[00:26:31] asking for questions. She's just pulling her leg. Okay. All right. I get it. You guys,

[00:26:35] you guys are just teasing me. She's right. What born pathogens? Holy, she knows all about

[00:26:41] She's going deep on us now. Pathogens. I can't even say that. Patho. Is that like,

[00:26:48] like a hurt pathogen or social pathogen? Every path leads to gin.

[00:26:57] Oh, shit. You need to copyright that. Yeah. We're not even a half hour into this. We're off

[00:27:05] the rails already. This is bad. It says 30 minutes, but I don't think it's after it. But

[00:27:10] no, we've got a little late kickoff. Yeah. So Stashe had technical problems again.

[00:27:15] Indeed. So one of the more unfortunate accidents that did have happened recently is

[00:27:22] the 72 year old hiker was found dead just below the summit of Mount Washington, New Hampshire. So this

[00:27:39] dead on the Mount Washington area, several first responders made their way up to retrieve the man's

[00:27:46] body and bring him back to the medical examiners for autopsy. And the exact cause of the man's death

[00:27:53] was still pending, but it appears to be the hiker likely succumbed to environmental exposure.

[00:28:00] Once again, Mount Washington is absolutely insane and could occur to anything at any time

[00:28:07] anywhere. He was wearing only jeans, a raincoat and hiking boots, but sounds appropriate for a 72

[00:28:16] year old man hiking. I mean, that's what they did it back in the days. And definitely not comparative

[00:28:22] conditions that were there and that are still currently present, which were each day we're

[00:28:30] lower and lower at the night of weather. We recently had some snow and Oregon and stuff like that.

[00:28:38] And once again, these times up in the mountains, we're talking about the high peaks areas not

[00:28:43] in the Catskills yet, but our prime conditions for hypothermia and weather related injuries,

[00:28:49] because after the times when the sun goes down, it could be 10 mile per hour winds

[00:28:57] and below the temperature of 30 degrees. And if you're out there unprepared, you could have problems.

[00:29:05] So unfortunate incident. That's really sad. That's tough. Yeah. It is sad. And you don't know what

[00:29:14] the precipitating factors were in terms of him basically being stranded up there to the

[00:29:20] injure himself and he wasn't able to move onward and just kind of like settled down

[00:29:25] in one spot for the night, but wasn't able to weather through the night or

[00:29:31] was he lost, disorientated. It's interesting. But one of the things that seems apparent from

[00:29:37] that article is he did not have a satellite communication device. I mean, I'm assuming

[00:29:44] he was conscious. I mean, he could have fallen down his head and been unconscious on the one

[00:29:49] hand, but on the other hand, it seems probable from the story that he was

[00:29:54] conscious and alert, but apparently didn't have a device to relate to others, his circumstances.

[00:30:03] Yeah. And Sarah guides in these kind of locations up in the Adirondacks and such,

[00:30:09] and she knows above exposure. So Sarah, you can say exposure that is a very serious problem.

[00:30:17] Yeah, it is. It's scary. And the scariest part is just the people who don't realize...

[00:30:23] Because how do you know? Until you've got the experience, a lot of people just don't know

[00:30:29] how different it is at the summit. I was at Cascade just a couple weeks ago, and most of the

[00:30:37] people coming down were so shocked to find that it was chilly up on the summit and right in

[00:30:44] the middle of summer, they were all complaining about how cold they were. And that's just Cascade,

[00:30:50] fortunately. That's a pretty quick hike, but Mount Washington is a completely different ballgame.

[00:30:56] And a lot of the peaks in the Adirondacks, it's the same thing. If you go out there unprepared,

[00:31:01] the base of the mountain is a beautiful, sunny, warm, comfortable day. And by the time you

[00:31:06] get to the summit, the conditions can be completely different. And Tad, like you were

[00:31:11] saying, who knows what happened? If you twist your ankle, that slows you down considerably.

[00:31:17] Then you don't have the ability to keep yourself warm and keep yourself moving.

[00:31:22] Yeah, precisely. Yeah.

[00:31:24] And I heard of a recent incident that they had up in New Hampshire of where people

[00:31:30] did their personal locator beak and they alerted 911. They told them, do you have

[00:31:36] sleeping bags and stuff to keep you warm? And they're like, yeah. Well,

[00:31:41] do get in them for overnight and you'll be fine until the morning. And that's what they did.

[00:31:45] And they were fine. And they made their way down to the Cog Railway and finally got a ride down

[00:31:51] from the Cog Railway. So apparently once again, a personal locator beak could be a life or death

[00:31:57] situation. But it's crazy to think about. Yeah, it's these personal locator beaks. Some people

[00:32:04] think they're overkill when you're trail hiking to popular places. But you could be the last one

[00:32:11] coming down and something happens to you and nobody else is coming along for the rest of the day.

[00:32:18] And that personal locator beak end or satellite messenger is the device that can save you.

[00:32:25] And also when you're out bushwhacking, one of the reasons that I used to justify my getting

[00:32:31] one is I really doubt anybody would find me for a couple of days. So to narrow down that search area

[00:32:39] is important to me at least. I think they're worth everybody. Yeah, with the spots we all go to

[00:32:47] with our interest in bushwhacking and just getting out of the way of people,

[00:32:53] it's just they're definitely worth it. I'll agree. Yeah. Yeah, so unfortunate incident. Of course,

[00:33:01] I'm out Washington. So all right. So thank you for shooting the shit, Sarah really appreciate it.

[00:33:08] You know, especially with you being on the phone, this is like the second time this has happened.

[00:33:13] The only other time this has happened is of course with you. Oh, come on, really?

[00:33:20] No, my takeaway is Sarah spent so much money sponsoring this podcast. She can't even afford

[00:33:28] any technology to get on Zoom. I heard it was a pay phone. I think I hear you putting quarters in

[00:33:37] like every three minutes. The operator comes on. Yeah. You have five minutes.

[00:33:45] All right. So thank you to the monthly supporters, Darren, Vicki, John, Betsy, Denise, Vanessa, Joseph,

[00:33:52] Jim C. Michael, David and Vanessa really appreciate you guys supporting the show.

[00:33:58] Also, thank you very much to the sponsors of the show. Scenic route guiding really appreciate

[00:34:04] you. What route guiding again was that scenic route guiding? If you're out guiding. Yes.

[00:34:10] If you're ready hit the trail. Make sure you take the scenic route. Their guides are to help you

[00:34:15] with your goals big or small like Marcy or slider alone of the Seward's. Check out scenic route

[00:34:21] guiding and gear rentals on Instagram and Facebook for more information. Also, if you

[00:34:25] mentioned the podcast, you can get 10% off use the code mountain lion.

[00:34:31] Sarah, you have a little involvement with scenic route guiding. Correct?

[00:34:35] Yeah, I was going to ask who are they? They sound like jerks.

[00:34:39] They're weirdos, but they're fun. They're fun. So also check out outdoor chronicles photography.

[00:34:47] Molly from outdoor chronicles photography specialized in adventure loam and adventure couple

[00:34:52] photography and the Catskills Adirondacks and White Mountains. She's an officiator for getting

[00:34:57] married, a license guide, but most important she's a story maker. Molly won't just give you

[00:35:02] photos. She'll give you memories that will last forever. Don't hesitate to get a hold of

[00:35:06] Molly on all platforms. So what do you drink in tonight, Sarah?

[00:35:14] Well, I think a better question you should be asking me is what are you wearing, Sarah?

[00:35:21] This isn't that type of show. Okay.

[00:35:25] My wife could be listening. I mean, what's going on here?

[00:35:31] You know this. You know this.

[00:35:33] Is it like that? You know the answer to this one.

[00:35:36] Oh, it's, you know, Ted, you would have known this answer if you were there.

[00:35:40] Oh, I saw the post. I saw the post. She was transformed. I'm not going to say dressed up

[00:35:49] because I'm not sure it was a costume or a transformation like a metamorphosis.

[00:35:54] A metamorphosis like that. Into a mountain lion.

[00:35:59] Mountain lion. So if we, to determine because we can't visualize you

[00:36:04] to make the determination with respect to whether it's a costume or a genetic alteration,

[00:36:11] can you just give us one mountain lion roar? Maybe at the end of the podcast.

[00:36:18] Okay. That'll keep everyone listening. Yeah. Everyone's going to have to stay tuned to the

[00:36:23] end and then we'll reveal. We'll have the revelation at the end. All right.

[00:36:30] So, Sarah, you having a coffee or a water? I'm having a bottle of water.

[00:36:35] Nice. Nice. Got to keep yourself hydrated. That's nice. Ted, what about you, sir?

[00:36:41] Yeah. I'm having some Costa Rican coffee that I roasted up this weekend and

[00:36:47] brewed just moments before we got online. It's quite tasty.

[00:36:51] It's fancy. Yeah, it's chocolate caffeine. That's what makes it yummy.

[00:36:56] A little too fancy for me. I'm having a awestruck Viking. So it looks like a lavender series hard

[00:37:05] cider. And you called me fancy? I wish I was calling out the color of my coffee. You've got

[00:37:13] like lavender, this, that, hold that back up again. It's a little bubbly. It's purple.

[00:37:18] Yeah. A little bubbly. All right. All right. Awestruck should be one of our sponsors. We

[00:37:23] should get them signed up and get at least free cider for you. That would be nice.

[00:37:30] That sounds like the type of drink somebody who pays $500 a night for a campsite would drink.

[00:37:35] You know it, Sarah. You know what the people that want a home with the helipad and woodstock,

[00:37:41] that's the type we're talking about. Stashes cap. I think Stashes cap says title list on it. Lean

[00:37:51] forward. Is that a golfing cap? Yeah, it is title list. Ottawa senator. Come on. Pro series,

[00:37:57] Ottawa senator. Yeah. All right. Previous hikes. Anybody had been on previous hikes?

[00:38:05] They want to mention about Ted. How about you? I didn't hike at all last weekend.

[00:38:10] Do you know that I was shackled against my will underneath a pop-up? I mean, we could probably

[00:38:18] tell the story of putting up the pop-up that had like out of the four legs only two were working.

[00:38:27] I don't know if you noticed, I noticed I didn't say anything at the time because I didn't want

[00:38:31] to gross you out, but did you notice that one of those legs that wasn't working that was kind

[00:38:34] of like broken and kept sliding down and looked like somebody's finger was stuck in it? Did you see

[00:38:41] that? Did not notice that. Yeah, I did. It was like all black and blue and gnarly. It had maggots on

[00:38:48] it. It was pretty gross, frankly. You gotta be like that then. That's not true. All right.

[00:38:54] Yeah. All right. Some of this stuff I am making up. So Ted and I were at the Woodland Valley

[00:39:02] campground doing some trailhead stewardship with the 35 on our club and the New York State DC.

[00:39:11] So there's good time. There's very slow day. We only saw 25 hikers. It was absolutely

[00:39:17] slow for a beautiful 75 degree day, I believe, 71 at the summit but with no wind. So it was

[00:39:30] perfect conditions for a hike in the Catskills on Sunday, if not the entire weekend. And we all

[00:39:37] know, all of us Catskill hikers know that Wittenberg is a very popular mountain to hike.

[00:39:45] And we had a total of what? 25 hikers for the day?

[00:39:49] 25. Wow. Yeah. The parking lot at best was maybe two-thirds full. Yeah. Right. And so it was,

[00:39:57] not overcrowded. It wasn't crowded at all. Everybody was very, you know, respectful and having a good

[00:40:04] time and they looked reasonably well-prepared or better. So Stosch and I did our thing. We

[00:40:12] chatted it up. We had, I don't know, Stosch shows up. I didn't really count. We had two

[00:40:18] packages of cookies. Right? Yeah. But yeah, like to me, it looked like, you know, a year's

[00:40:24] supply worth the cookies. And not a lot of takers, except for that one young kid, I put him at age 12.

[00:40:31] He came back for like seconds, thirds, fourths. Yeah, Liam, that was it. Yeah. I think that was

[00:40:36] the best part of the day for him was the cookies at the end. Yeah. His dad didn't want him to

[00:40:41] touch those but he came back. He had like six and then he came back for seconds and he took

[00:40:46] like eight more. So good for him. Liam's spending this weekend at the dentist's office.

[00:40:54] Yeah. He, they're great people. I got to admit, you know, we, we taught a couple people how to

[00:40:59] read a map and such like that. You know, one of the ladies that we talked with was hiking with,

[00:41:06] was going to hike in the New Hampshire area with Eric Todd Sweet, the most famous New Hampshire

[00:41:13] hiker. Yeah, that guy's super cool. And but she didn't know how to read a map though.

[00:41:20] Okay. Oh yeah, they did, you know what they did? Cornelian Wittenberg recently, he came to the

[00:41:25] Catskills. That's right. That must have been, I think I know who you're talking about.

[00:41:29] Yeah. He's a very cool dude and such but she didn't know how to, how to read a map. So we,

[00:41:35] we taught her how to read a map. So it was pretty cool. You know, I think we'll just get

[00:41:40] intimidated. She can read a map. I think she just needed someone to sit down and point a few

[00:41:45] things out to her. I do think people just, it's daunting for a lot of people.

[00:41:51] She took it really well and she, she understood what we were talking about and such so hopefully

[00:41:58] she learns. Yeah. Well, all the Lord's work. I love it. Yeah, right. But we never saw her again.

[00:42:06] She did. Yeah, right. She should have been back in the parking lot at least an hour before

[00:42:10] we left and now we never saw her again. I think her car is still there.

[00:42:16] But we did, we did teach her how to read a map that we know. Maybe that's the problem. Maybe you

[00:42:22] guys taught her how to read the map. Thank you, Sarah. Thank you for your sponsorship.

[00:42:28] We appreciate the support. I think what I read, what I read is she hooked up with Jay Leno

[00:42:34] on the trail. Okay. I'll try to back. They're in lost. Yeah. Cool time at Woodland Valley. If you

[00:42:45] want to sign up for the 3,500 club trail, it's a pretty cool time. Sarah, what did you end up doing?

[00:42:53] Yeah. My last hike was a pretty special one. I went with Yana, my friend Yana and a group

[00:42:58] of people. We did the rock shelter trail to the Mary Glenn trail and up to the escarpment

[00:43:04] so that Yana could finish the last, I think, 0.2 miles of her all trails challenge.

[00:43:11] She had somehow missed two tenths of a mile. She had hiked up the escarpment to a certain lookout

[00:43:21] and then she hiked the other direction to one of the other lookouts

[00:43:27] and missed that space in between. And that was before she was interested in doing the

[00:43:31] all trails challenge so it wasn't really on her radar. And as she's going over her spreadsheet and

[00:43:37] her map, she realized, oh man, I've got this nice little two tenths of a mile I have to cover.

[00:43:44] She's kicking herself, I think, a little when she first realized it, but it worked out perfectly

[00:43:48] because we had an awesome day. A bunch of people it poured to start with. So we were swimming

[00:43:57] through the parking lot and as soon as we were ready to hit the trail, it just cleared right up.

[00:44:03] It was foggy, it was gloomy, spooky. It was just a good day. Very good timing.

[00:44:08] Those gloomy, spooky, foggy days. Yeah, they're sometimes the best day to be under the canopy.

[00:44:14] Right? Yeah, we're comfortable. Yeah, if you're hiking for a view on a day like that,

[00:44:21] you're not going to get it. But if you're going to take in what's underneath the canopy

[00:44:26] and all those surroundings, those are fun days to be in the CAT skills. So sounds good. So she

[00:44:35] finished it off and what's... Did she announce what her next challenge, if any, is going to be?

[00:44:41] Yeah, we're trying to figure that one out. I think she's going to let me finish this one.

[00:44:46] I think she's got a few ideas in mind. I've got a few ideas in mind. I'm hoping maybe

[00:44:51] they'll coordinate so we can keep doing our hikes together. Cool. She's accomplished a lot.

[00:45:00] She's walked a lot of miles. She really has. She is very motivated. She really gets it done.

[00:45:08] Yeah, she's amazing. But it's funny, in the middle of all the hiking, she doesn't just do

[00:45:15] that one thing. You know what I mean? It's... I don't know how she gets it all done,

[00:45:19] where some people focus on the grid and that's all they do. But she's concurrently got multiple

[00:45:26] projects going on that she manages to get them accomplished. Yeah. She does birding and stuff

[00:45:34] like that all over the place. I'm pretty sure she's done the 115 and the 67, 46er. She's

[00:45:43] all over the place and super jealous of what she's done. Her grid finished her grid.

[00:45:50] Grid, right? Yeah. Yeah. The birding, she's amazing with her bird watching. I guess there are blocks

[00:46:00] that you have to go and record certain species of birds. So while she's finishing her all trails,

[00:46:07] on the way home from a hike, she'll say, oh, there's this block. I have to go record some

[00:46:12] whatever it is she's recording. She tells me I'm getting better, but I'm not there yet.

[00:46:19] I can recognize the oven bird. Do you ever call her a boomer? Be like, God, boomer, you birding stuff?

[00:46:27] That's not nice. No. It's not nice. That's funny because I'm starting to do that as well.

[00:46:34] I'm just like, ooh, that is a woodthrush. I know woodthrush, like a blue jay, a cat bird,

[00:46:46] and that's about it. You know, I got to see and hear the big mill thrush.

[00:46:53] How much different is it than the woodthrush?

[00:46:59] I can't remember what a woodthrush. Don't tell Yana. I don't remember what a woodthrush looks

[00:47:03] so I couldn't tell you. Okay, okay. I'm very curious. Yeah, I will have to ask her.

[00:47:12] Probably not too much different. I mean, what's a woodthrush look like? A little brown bird?

[00:47:17] Yeah, it's very similar. That narrows it down a little brown bird. Yeah. It was a little brown.

[00:47:23] It looks like wood with some wings on it. That's how I know what they are.

[00:47:28] Yeah. No, but it was pretty awesome. We actually ran into Jim and Margaret.

[00:47:34] Nice. Cool. Yeah. So that was a pretty good day for me. I guess you see those on the big mill.

[00:47:43] Try to get the canned man on here, but he doesn't like technology and then apparently

[00:47:48] he doesn't like Zoom, but he participates in Zoom all the time. So I got to pound that into his head.

[00:47:55] Yeah, he would actually, I mean, I'm not trying to bully him, but he would be a wonderful guest.

[00:48:02] Yeah. Yama, and he's got so much of it. Now, the problem I have with Jim is I never know if

[00:48:07] he's telling me the truth or not. He gives me a lot of information, but sometimes I think he sends

[00:48:12] me on wild goose chases. I think he makes up stories just to see me jump through hoops.

[00:48:18] Yeah, well, but you do the same for him with your writings in the lean twos.

[00:48:23] That was not me. I am in assistant of those charges. Now, I will tell you, I have done it

[00:48:29] on multiple occasions and when I looked at that, I thought that does look like mine,

[00:48:34] but it wasn't because that was from this year. So that was definitely not mine.

[00:48:37] I think somebody's out there happy catting me. I think it was an AI generated entry.

[00:48:43] It did seem like AI. Unbelievable. So good. You know, I was hopefully getting it out today,

[00:48:51] but I slept in. I felt like sleeping in. It was a great time. I'm sorry. I felt bad.

[00:48:57] I was going to go to Platacal, uh, Platacal ski resort, the area and do the north side, but

[00:49:05] I just decided to sleep in. So screw that next week, next week though. I did get out though.

[00:49:11] I did. I will say, Tad and Sarah, that I did get out to Bel Air last week and did their disc golfing

[00:49:18] course on the lower part. Absolutely phenomenal time. It was beautiful. And, and I just don't

[00:49:24] understand why they pump all this money into millions and millions of dollars into a ski

[00:49:30] resort, but they can't replace a sign over on the Seeger area showing where big Indian and eagle is.

[00:49:38] Yeah. Silence. Complete silence. No, I mean, you know, I, and I misspoke last week when

[00:49:45] I said that, uh, Wyndham was the state owned and run area. It's, it's, um, Bel Air. And that's one of my,

[00:49:52] you know, looked eye for decades was an avid skier. I've skied at Bel Air and Wyndham and Hunter

[00:49:58] and Platacal and, uh, you know, a ton of ski areas over the years. But if I was a ski area

[00:50:05] owner operator in the state of New York was competing with me, you know, putting in gondolas,

[00:50:12] having basically an unlimited snow making budget, not being able to worry about whether they make a

[00:50:17] profit or a loss in any given year because they're backed by the state of New York. I mean, that's,

[00:50:21] that's pretty tough for another local operator to swallow. And then I don't know if you're going

[00:50:26] to bring up tonight or not bring up tonight the situation on what is it? Balsam Lake and the,

[00:50:32] the cabin. That might be next week. Okay. So next, next week remind me if you want me to

[00:50:39] queue up and do a rant about how much money got dumped into Bel Air and other projects that don't

[00:50:48] see any money. Yeah, yeah. Crazy, crazy. All right. Yeah, I'm ready to move along. Yeah, yeah,

[00:50:56] we'll move along. So once again, thank you guys for getting out and enjoying the areas of the

[00:51:03] Catskill. So once again, Catskill News Volunteer 3500 Club Catskills, Chiro Clue Catskill Mountain

[00:51:10] Club Visitor Center, Jolly Rover Chiro Crew and the Play Me Mountain Fire Tower are all looking

[00:51:14] for volunteers. Excuse me. Also stickers, if you want stickers get ahold of me or go to Camp

[00:51:21] Catskill. You know, Ryan Penny from Camp Catskill told me that they're out of stickers

[00:51:26] and I need to send them more. I was just like you're lying to me. That's not,

[00:51:31] I guess it's real. So I got to send them stickers. So they're nice stickers. I could see them going

[00:51:37] really quickly. Yeah, I've been selling them on eBay myself making a fortune mother. That's how

[00:51:43] I afford these fancy headphones. I sign it Stash, your good friend Stash. ST, O, S, H.

[00:51:51] I just signed it SR with an exclamation mark. Nice. That's it.

[00:51:56] Seeing a face. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. It's as an equivocal meaning. So people

[00:52:02] interpret out of it what they want. I like that. SR. Yeah. So this weekend we'll talk about the

[00:52:10] weather forecast. So Friday looks to be beautiful. A high of 59, a low of 55 with very minimal winds

[00:52:20] clear as we go into Saturday. Some clouds, a little bit of light rain into the morning and

[00:52:26] afternoon. A high of 63, a low of 57. The heavier rain will be into the night. So if you're going

[00:52:35] to go on a back action trip, be prepared for the heavy rain on the night. Sunday, rain showers

[00:52:41] in the morning, some clouds in the afternoon that's going to turn into a beautiful day later

[00:52:46] on. A low later on in the night of 43, but a high of 66. So it's going to look to be a pretty good

[00:52:55] day Sunday if you're getting out a little bit later. So once again, pack that rain gear because

[00:53:00] we're in the time of year where it could rain. It could not rain a little spark of a rain

[00:53:07] shower could happen and you never know what could dampen you and we could have high winds

[00:53:12] and it could chill you down. So yeah, so it does. So let's get on to some sponsors, the last set of

[00:53:24] sponsors. So have you ever wanted to learn more about hiking or backpacking or even just brush up

[00:53:29] on some of your old skills in the back country? Check out Trail Bomb Project, a hiking and

[00:53:34] backpacking school. Scott and Joe from the New Jersey search and rescue team have amazing

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[00:53:48] anything from first aid, map and compass and many other skills that can help you and others.

[00:53:54] Check out them out on all social media platforms. Also is it time for some new gear

[00:54:00] hiking in Catskill? Say no more. Camp Catskill in Tannersville has all your hiking needs,

[00:54:05] footwear socks, moisture wicking shirts, freeze drive mails and even more. Catskill merchandise

[00:54:10] is always available. They have all the essentials for your hiking needs.

[00:54:14] Locate in Tannersville and online. Check out Camp Catskill. Also if you want three stickers,

[00:54:19] stop here in Tannersville. So check out Another Summit, a nonprofit program that leads outdoor

[00:54:26] adventures and activities for veterans and first responders for free. Apply today on another

[00:54:32] summit.org. So let's get on to the guests of the night.

[00:54:39] Who's that? I don't know. Who is that? That's you. I think, no, I thought tonight,

[00:54:44] I thought we were having a mountain lion on this show tonight. Oh,

[00:54:48] a previously known online. So Sarah Braykin is here tonight. How do you say your middle,

[00:54:54] your other part of your name? That's my maiden name, Presta Giacomo or Presta Giacomo.

[00:55:00] It depends on, I guess, who in the family you talk to. But shortened to Presti.

[00:55:08] Presti. I don't know why. That is a very tough name. It's a tad. Yeah, it's a tough one.

[00:55:15] It is. But Sarah is going to be on here tonight to talk about her all-strials challenge

[00:55:20] and she is about to finish that up. And we're going to talk about the lesser

[00:55:23] traveled trails in the Catskills that you should participate in. And you know what,

[00:55:27] Tad's going to chime in on this because he's been involved in this as well.

[00:55:31] Oh, she had to say who's dad? Yeah. Who is dad? Who is he? Is there a tad? I'm not sure.

[00:55:39] We already know about Tad. Who cares about Tad? Nobody cares about that.

[00:55:44] Tad who? So, Sarah, why don't you tell those, I mean, you were on episode seven, seven freaking

[00:55:50] Jesus. I'm OG.

[00:55:54] OG. So 130 episodes ago. So why don't you give a little background about yourself?

[00:56:01] Yeah. Well, let's see. I am the owner of the Scenic Group Guiding and Gear Rentals.

[00:56:08] Yeah, I just, I love to hike. I started guiding around 2019 and I'm a public school teacher. I'm

[00:56:19] a day job. So, you know, education has always been important to me and I love the outdoors. So I really

[00:56:25] thought I'd be doing a lot more of the outdoor education type classes. And it just kind of has

[00:56:32] evolved over the years into, you know, we do just about everything. We dip our toes into just

[00:56:38] about everything. We do guided hikes. We do group hikes. My friend Chad Simpson with

[00:56:43] Northern Ridge Line. He does wilderness first aid trainings and he invited me to assist him with

[00:56:50] those. So that was really exciting. We have one of those coming up in January if anybody's interested

[00:56:56] and yeah, it's just been a lot of fun. I love it. So with Scenic Group Guiding,

[00:57:02] you started out by yourself, correct? And now has it blossomed into a couple people, right?

[00:57:08] Yeah, yeah. I've got Sarah King is guiding for me. Katie Rhodes, she has taken a little hiatus

[00:57:16] because she is out in the Adirondacks doing amazing things. She's gone back to school and

[00:57:23] she's just crushing it. She's incredible. So she's taken a little bit of a break. My friend Myra,

[00:57:29] she says she'd like to guide for me every once in a while. My buddy Sean. So it's nice.

[00:57:35] Myra and Sean. Ew, gross. I know. Well, no, Sean. Ew, Myra's great. Myra's cool. She's got a,

[00:57:43] I had her, I gotta get ahold of her until they're come back on the show for some of the words, please.

[00:57:48] But Sean. Ew. What would you have him on for? I had him on for winter,

[00:57:56] winter summer or winter stuff and it was just absolutely atrocious. Only episode I didn't

[00:58:02] listen to. Yeah, so now you've blossomed scenic route guiding and you guys do

[00:58:11] Catskills in Adirondacks, Hudson Valley area? Yes. Yep. We've gone over to Vermont a little bit,

[00:58:18] but it's primarily Adirondacks and Catskills. And it's nice because I've got Sarah and Katie,

[00:58:24] they like to stick to the Adirondacks. Myra and Sean, they like the Catskills. I'm midway

[00:58:32] between both. So it's easy for me to get to either one. Nice. So we got all covered. It's nice.

[00:58:39] So congratulations on your program and stuff, such like that. You know, I support that of

[00:58:44] course, the local area guiding and the big question is of the night, the huge question is

[00:58:51] why would you support this horrible cop-ass? Why don't you want to go with like the DEC

[00:58:56] podcast and stuff? Well, listen, I originally, I wanted to sponsor sounds like a search and rescue,

[00:59:04] but they are too rich for my blood. They sent me the paperwork. It's like they wanted my kidney,

[00:59:10] my first born day. It was just it was a lot. I didn't want to sign up for that. And then I

[00:59:15] thought, well, listen, Stash takes Apple Pay. So why not? And then the problem with Apple Pay

[00:59:22] is I have no idea how to cancel it. I tried. God knows I tried and I wound up canceling my

[00:59:29] Jesus of the month club. So I thought, I took that risk. This is becoming hurtful.

[00:59:36] This is therapy. Yes. I have her back on the show.

[00:59:41] Sarah with trash talk like that. Listen, you know, you ask me this, what do I tell you,

[00:59:46] you tell me, what have I told you? Why do I support your show?

[00:59:53] Because you're desperate. I don't know. I'm I'm I'm tabling the turn on you here.

[01:00:01] No, because I believe in what you're doing and doing a good job.

[01:00:04] You obviously you have great taste in guests, right? And I got to admit it's very,

[01:00:11] it's fun. And with the sponsors of the show, I enjoy, you know, putting out what you guys kind of

[01:00:22] deserve somewhat is not just the the algae stuff like that, you know, the most known

[01:00:30] stuff of the podcast of the Catskills. You deserve what is is not known of the podcast of

[01:00:37] Jesus of the Catskills, you know, stalk talk about the reservoirs and stuff, you know, it gets you

[01:00:44] interested in the Catskills instead of, you know, what is this invasive species that's happening

[01:00:49] over on this area that you already know about? Well, and that's I think if people are more

[01:00:56] invested in the area, they're going to take better care of the area. You know, just like

[01:01:02] you were talking about, you know, what's going on at Woodstock, it's more than just hiking,

[01:01:08] you know, we can show up those of us who don't live in the in the communities,

[01:01:12] you know, you need to take an interest in the community in order to really care about

[01:01:19] what you're doing and where you are. And I think you getting the word out

[01:01:25] and educating people is important. You know, we love the Catskills and

[01:01:30] things like what you know, that's all part of the culture. Things that are going on in

[01:01:34] Xerras, it's important. Yeah. And I appreciate you supporting this podcast and

[01:01:40] it's very, I feel very humbled, especially since you've been here from the beginning,

[01:01:46] basically. So I do speak with me to this long, which is absolutely insane over 130 episodes.

[01:01:54] Jesus Christ, it's insane. And you know what? I think we needed a Catskill podcast when I

[01:01:59] first started hiking in the Catskills. I did a cert, I actually didn't, I was late to the podcast

[01:02:05] game, but when I discovered podcasts, my life was changed. And I searched for Catskills podcasts,

[01:02:12] and there are a couple out there. But you know, I think you do a really good job of highlighting,

[01:02:18] in addition to the communities, the personalities. And one thing that makes Catskill hiking

[01:02:23] unique are the personalities, are the people who are out there. And yeah, I think that's important.

[01:02:31] You do a good job, you do good work. And listen, I would not sponsor you if I didn't believe in

[01:02:36] you because that Cheese of the Month Club is expensive. I don't get the dots.

[01:02:42] I mean, yeah, you're at a parking lot supporting this show. So listening to podcasts before you

[01:02:49] go home, right? Get in the fill. Absolutely. Some people are home watching Netflix, Sarah's

[01:02:56] in a Stewart's parking lot someplace, curled up in her car, drinking water, eating cheese and

[01:03:03] doing podcast work. Yeah. Hey, listen, it's a life. I like it. I've got a good one.

[01:03:11] Somebody's got to do it. That's all I'm saying.

[01:03:13] That's right. Just like a mountain lion no less.

[01:03:17] Yes, that's when you're going to get the free water because everybody clears the area.

[01:03:22] So Sarah, on a more serious note, one of the things I've noticed since I've been doing this

[01:03:28] hiking gig for maybe eight years now, you see people that start off hiking. For me, it's I

[01:03:35] see people starting off in the Catskills or in the Herriman area. And they do a round,

[01:03:39] maybe then they do the winners. And then the next thing you know, they're getting their

[01:03:43] guiding license from the DVC. So what is your advice for you as somebody who's

[01:03:51] not only experienced in guiding, but you're running a guiding business, you have multiple guides

[01:03:55] working for you. Presumably, you've nailed down the how to do a guiding business.

[01:04:01] So what's your advice to somebody who's thinking about getting a license or just

[01:04:06] got their license? What's your words of wisdom?

[01:04:09] Yeah, I think it's really important to always keep in mind that your time with them

[01:04:18] can make or break how they feel about hiking. I know that sounds pretty heavy, but...

[01:04:24] Heavy as fuck.

[01:04:26] Yes. Yeah, you have to be... I mean, we've all had those days where we just don't want to

[01:04:33] be in the woods. You know, they are the best of times and they're the worst of times.

[01:04:37] But as a guide, you really cannot afford to have those worst of times. Hiking is more than

[01:04:43] just taking a walk for a lot of people. It's... We have an emotional connection.

[01:04:48] Every footstep, a lot of... For a lot of people, it's their therapy.

[01:04:52] It's how they process the events going on in their lives. For a lot of people,

[01:04:58] it is the biggest accomplishment. Maybe they have done in... Who knows how long?

[01:05:07] This is a big deal for them and you have to understand that it's more than just a hike

[01:05:15] for a lot of people. As a guide, I've maybe hiked Marcy, I don't know, seven, eight times.

[01:05:23] But for that person who breaks tree line for that first time, or let's pick something in the

[01:05:30] Catskills. We're talking about the Catskills, but it doesn't matter. Devils path, wherever.

[01:05:35] That thing that they have been looking forward to and it's a huge deal for them. It's just

[01:05:42] important to always remind yourself that no matter how many times you've done that particular hike,

[01:05:47] this is their first time and you got to keep that back in your mind.

[01:05:52] That's powerful. Yeah. I agree. It means so much to them and it's easy to lose sight of that. When

[01:06:00] you get into the drudgery of the business, you're paying your insurance and you're doing

[01:06:06] your social media campaigns and all that stuff. You just have to really try to remember that

[01:06:13] magical feeling you had that first time you did that hike when you were new at it.

[01:06:18] Yeah. I agree with you that it's hiked your own hike, but when you're with someone else,

[01:06:28] you got to hike their own hike as well to make them comfortable in the area, especially the

[01:06:34] Catskills at Arondacks and such like that. You're running a business, it's all about them.

[01:06:40] Mm-hmm. You have people like you and Sarah and Sachin, Myra and Sean who are considerate of the

[01:06:47] area and maybe take a break here once here or there and teach them about these trees or what

[01:06:55] birds you hear or what mountain lines you might see upon the next area. Absolutely.

[01:07:03] Like I said before, people are going to take better care of their natural world

[01:07:09] if they're invested in it. I have six, 10 hours with them to show them as much as I can about the

[01:07:17] area so that they see the magic in it that we all know about, that it's more than just a trail.

[01:07:26] People are more inclined to vote for politicians who are going to

[01:07:33] send money to the Catskills, send money to the region if they love the area. So yeah,

[01:07:39] it's important. It's their hike, but you also want to make sure that you're giving them

[01:07:44] the information they need about it so they can feel connected to it.

[01:07:48] Yeah. Yeah. I mean, one of my radical ideas that I can segue from what you just said is

[01:07:56] that the DEC is investigating and considering what to do about the

[01:08:04] herd paths that are all over the untrailed or the summits without trails marked leading to

[01:08:13] the canister. And so they're considering what action they should take if any. And

[01:08:19] I think one of the things they ought to consider is requiring people or at least one hike when

[01:08:28] they hike up one of those mountains to go with the guide. Somebody who can teach them the

[01:08:34] importance of those surroundings and how to travel over that terrain causing the least

[01:08:41] amount of impact and appreciating what's taken literally not just hundreds, but thousands and

[01:08:48] tens of thousands and millions of years to become the natural habitat up there. So

[01:08:56] it's not just a drum-up business for guides, but it's just to protect that environment,

[01:09:02] not only for the animals that call it home, but for future generations of hikers.

[01:09:06] It's something that we've been privileged to enjoy during our lifetime, but 100 years from now,

[01:09:11] what would it be like for younger folks that folks that have any future generations?

[01:09:19] I will agree with you on that. I would go as far as to say, I'd volunteer my time for that.

[01:09:24] I don't think that it should be monetized. And that's a tough thing as a guide,

[01:09:30] monetizing the outdoors. There's that fine line between is it ethical? Yeah,

[01:09:37] I'm not taking money on behalf of public land. I'm sharing my expertise and my wisdom and keeping

[01:09:47] people safe while I'm out there, but I definitely agree with you. I would say though, I think it

[01:09:52] should not be something that people would have to pay for. I think it's such a limited

[01:09:59] activity for a lot of people already. I think we need a lot more diversity in the hiking world,

[01:10:05] and there are populations of people who don't have access to the outdoors the same way that I do.

[01:10:11] I'm very privileged. I can grab my gear and go take a hike just about any time I want to,

[01:10:16] but yeah, I think that's important. With the Catskill 3,500 Club, they already have

[01:10:20] hike leaders that provide that service. And they don't have to have the full

[01:10:27] fledged guiding license that you have. I know just down the road from where I live in the

[01:10:32] Catskills, the gunks. There's areas in the gunks that you're only supposed to go into

[01:10:40] with somebody who has a certain level of training to escort you and guide you through that area,

[01:10:48] A for your safety, but also for the safety of that environment.

[01:10:52] And I don't really think that's too much to ask to protect those areas in the Catskills

[01:10:59] that are sensitive. And I'm also saying it doesn't have to be that every time somebody goes up there,

[01:11:05] they need to go up there with somebody on the list. But maybe before you go up there,

[01:11:10] you should A, have at least one guided or educational hike into that area and then

[01:11:16] demonstrate some level of proficiency. And I'm going to remind Stosh that in part,

[01:11:22] these thoughts, although I've had them for over a year,

[01:11:25] these thoughts were firmly cemented in my head two weeks ago when I was hanging out in the

[01:11:31] shot road parking area, watching what unfolded. So I'm just saying that I'm just throwing that

[01:11:38] out there again. Yeah. And so once again, people like Sarah guides and stuff teach you so much.

[01:11:45] So it's great to go out with a guide, you know, once or twice and then maybe get your foot

[01:11:50] in the door. So once again, thank you Sarah for doing that. Also, so what got you involved in the

[01:11:59] all trail challenge? Yeah, well, you know, just looking at the map, I love maps. I've always

[01:12:07] loved maps. You know, we had talked about that young, that woman you spoke with in the parking lot,

[01:12:15] um, Woodland Valley. I think most people do know how to read a map. I think it's daunting for a lot

[01:12:21] of people the more time you spend with your map, the easier, the easier it gets, you know, and

[01:12:27] look at what you guys are able to do for her just in the matter of a few minutes. You sat down

[01:12:31] with her and you pointed out a few things and you really got her a good start. So just kind

[01:12:37] of pouring over my maps, noticing that there was a lot more to the cat skills than just

[01:12:44] the 3500s, you know, and it kind of start looking at these unusual names like Giggle Hollow. What's so

[01:12:51] funny about that trail? I'm curious. You know, there's just a lot out there that I would see on

[01:12:57] my map and just start to wonder what that trail looked like. Um, you know, also from a conservation

[01:13:04] standpoint, you know, I am a big fan of leave no trace, maybe not the organization but the concept

[01:13:12] that, you know, I want to at least leave the areas I visit as good as I found them, if not better.

[01:13:20] So how can I do that? If I love these mountains and I want to hike and re-hike all of these peaks,

[01:13:28] you know, how do I justify that? How do I do it ethically? And one of the ways to do that

[01:13:33] is finding alternative routes. You know, you can take a group of 15 or 20 people up the same

[01:13:40] trail or the same mountain every month, but is that necessarily the right thing to do for your

[01:13:48] environment? So starting to look at peaks I wanted to revisit and maybe there's an alternative route,

[01:13:54] right? So no, I started doing that. I do love to bushwhack and of course that's not related

[01:14:01] to all trails, but just different ways of getting to places I wanted to visit again. And um, yeah.

[01:14:10] McKinley Hollow, Fox Hollow, you know, Curtis Ohmpe's new trail, uh, going up from the

[01:14:15] Neversonk area to the slide. So many different areas to go up and, and you know, it's crazy

[01:14:24] when you go out to New Hampshire and stuff and you see that there are six, seven, eight trails

[01:14:31] going up to lead in the Soptable on one mountain. And you kind of wonder, is it good for the mountain?

[01:14:39] But it kind of is because, you know, you have a bunch of different options. You have a short way,

[01:14:46] you have a long way, you have a more scenic way, you have a an easier or a more nature way.

[01:14:53] And you know, it's kind of like, when is this going to come to the Catskills?

[01:14:57] Somewhat, you know, we had two ways up slide, sort of right to two, three ways up slide.

[01:15:03] Can there be more? You know, should we offer more? You know, Tad, Tad's having a little sideways

[01:15:09] head right there. Yeah. You know, in part, it's a great idea, but I don't know what the

[01:15:15] percentage is of trail maintenance in the Catskills. Correct. Correct.

[01:15:19] Undertaken by volunteers versus, you know, paid for by the state and the DEC. And

[01:15:27] you don't want to get that trail network so far ahead of the volunteer and paid workforce that

[01:15:33] it just can't be maintained. You know, it'd be nice to have on the one hand, maybe some more

[01:15:40] hiking trails in the Catskills. On the other hand, it seems like we have a lot more than

[01:15:46] the state is willing pay to be managed. Yeah. So,

[01:15:50] I don't know that the answer is creating more trails, but just being aware of your impact.

[01:15:59] And you know, there are a lot of trails in the Catskills. They don't all live,

[01:16:04] they don't all lead to a summit or, you know, a view like Wittenberg. But just maybe stepping

[01:16:12] back and realizing there's a lot more to the Catskills than 3,500s. You know, there's a lot of magic

[01:16:20] out there. And you know, you're missing, I mean 350 miles in change of trails in the Catskills.

[01:16:28] There's so much to see. You will never be bored. So one thing I like to ask folks like you that

[01:16:34] have a broader spectrum than myself, I mainly just like the Catskills these days. What is

[01:16:41] it that draws you to the Catskills versus the Adirondacks? Because where you live, it seems

[01:16:47] maybe even the Adirondacks are closer to you than the Catskills. So what brings you down here

[01:16:55] to do something like the Altrails Challenge? Well, I have been focusing on the Catskills a

[01:17:02] little more because of the Altrails Challenge. I love the Adirondacks. I think,

[01:17:08] I mean, I love hiking. I would go, I don't think I've met a mountain that I don't like. But

[01:17:13] you know, as much as I love the Adirondacks, there is something so special about the Catskills

[01:17:18] for me. There have been so many magical moments in the Catskills that just, I don't know,

[01:17:26] I hate to sound cheesy, but the more I hike the Catskills, the more I believe in magic.

[01:17:33] And I don't know how else to say it. There's just something special to me about those woods and

[01:17:40] the trails and, I don't know. I think people who hike the Catskills understand that.

[01:17:47] Yeah, I gotta admit there is a whole different vibe down here in the Catskills with the people

[01:17:54] that you meet and stuff like that. It seems like people in the Catskills are more out there

[01:17:59] for nature and more out there for their experience than to get the peaks. I mean, that's what I see.

[01:18:06] That's just me? Yeah, I think it is a different vibe. I'm not knocking the Adirondacks. It's

[01:18:12] not a better vibe or a worse vibe. It's just different. You know, the, I don't know. Yeah,

[01:18:18] I don't see that. I think the people in the Adirondacks are equally in love with the area

[01:18:25] and love it and care for it the way that the people in the Catskills do. There is a lot of

[01:18:32] crossover between Adirondacks and Catskills. Like I said, I've been spending a lot of time in the

[01:18:36] Catskills because of the all trails challenge. But yeah, there are differences just geographically.

[01:18:45] Well, and obviously, there was different forces that formed each. And one of the things that

[01:18:51] I have this uneducated and informal sense of is it's really hard if you're a Catskill hiker to

[01:19:02] brag about some ultra epic day climbing these peaks above trail lines with these epic winter

[01:19:10] conditions that are going to impress people that aren't even hikers, right? So I tend to think

[01:19:18] that after somebody does a round or two in the Catskills, unless they really love, love hiking

[01:19:24] there, they move on. And the people like me, I mean, I, you know, to a certain extent, I could drive

[01:19:31] to the Adirondacks, I could drive up to New Hampshire and hike those mountains, obviously,

[01:19:36] they're further for me. And the Catskills are kind of a stone's throw. But I just kind of like

[01:19:40] in the Catskills, you're under the canopy and I just feel closer and more connected

[01:19:48] with that wilderness and wild experience than I did decades ago when I climbed up in the Adirondacks.

[01:19:57] Or recently when I climbed up in New Hampshire with my daughter, I kind of like was concerned on

[01:20:02] the way up that I was going to drive up there and then never want to return to the Catskills

[01:20:06] and hike because it just wasn't going to be the same. And although it was really,

[01:20:11] really cool doing the two hikes that we did, it didn't cool off my enthusiasm for the Catskills.

[01:20:20] So Sarah, we're glad that you love our Catskill Mountains and you're in our podcast.

[01:20:27] You know what it is? Well, thank you. But there's a subtlety about the Catskills

[01:20:32] that I think maybe, you know, because let's face it, you do hear a lot of Adirondack hikers knock

[01:20:37] the Catskills. We'll just get that out there, the elephant in the room. But I do think there's

[01:20:43] a subtlety about the Catskills that if you are looking for those big epic, vast summit views,

[01:20:51] you're going to overlook. But if you just step back and allow yourself to

[01:21:00] see the beauty in it, you're hooked. Yeah. And that's I'm the same way. You know,

[01:21:09] I'm an hour and a half from the Catskills. And to be honest, I'm like four and a half hours

[01:21:13] from the Lodge and the Adirondacks. But I don't know why the Catskills just draw me because

[01:21:19] I'm more away from people. I'm more away from stupidity, I guess, if I don't go to Caterskill

[01:21:25] Falls and stuff like that. But I mean, it connects me with nature. And that's the way I am, I guess.

[01:21:35] If you love the Catskills, like you said with Tad and Sarah, you'll keep coming back and such.

[01:21:41] So Tad, you are doing this as well. I mean, you're probably not as close as Sarah is,

[01:21:48] but how much do you have left? I have not made a tally sheet or what the hell.

[01:21:58] But yeah, I'm just going by the my my GPS tracks and what trails and I don't even know if they're

[01:22:07] part of the challenge or not. That's kind of what makes it fun for me is not knowing what's

[01:22:12] on the list and what's off the list has me hiking every fucking trail I can find. Okay.

[01:22:20] And so some of them have been really cool. And when I go when I maybe, you know, at the end of

[01:22:26] summer, when I when I start really digging into my fall hiking plans, I'll look through and see

[01:22:32] what I have left to knock off. But I've hiked some cool stuff that I expect is not at all

[01:22:39] on that list. And I'm thankful that I didn't check the list and focus on the list because I hit some

[01:22:45] stuff that was, you know, out of bounds and cool and interesting. And I learned that because I got

[01:22:51] focused on doing the 420 for like the last 18 or 24 months that I was doing that. And so every

[01:22:59] weekend that was just knocking off mountains on my list. And so I've become adverse to looking

[01:23:07] at those lists. But I'm getting there, I bet you if there's 350 miles on the list,

[01:23:12] I can't imagine that I've got anything more than 10% to go. So.

[01:23:17] Oh, nice. Yeah.

[01:23:18] And nothing like Sarah. So, Ted, you're out of this conversation, Sarah.

[01:23:22] Yep. All right. So I'll see you next week, Stosh. Yeah.

[01:23:26] Just got kicked off the show. You'll be, Stosh, she'll be hearing from my lawyers

[01:23:31] the firm of, I just hired them. It's the firm of do we hike more than how?

[01:23:38] Do we?

[01:23:38] Do we?

[01:23:39] Do we hike more than how they're my attorneys and you'll be hearing from them?

[01:23:43] I guess we'll have...

[01:23:44] I feel like my parents are divorcing or something. Don't leave.

[01:23:52] So Sarah with the lesser travels kind of like trails, what would you recommend that people

[01:24:00] would do that wouldn't be the area that they would see like, oh, you know,

[01:24:06] like let's go up Balsam and such like that.

[01:24:09] Yeah. Do you want lesser known recommendations is what you're asking?

[01:24:14] Yeah. I love anything in the Western Catskills. They are for a lot of people a real pain in the

[01:24:22] neck to get to. They are out there, but you know, if you can get a buddy, if you can work

[01:24:30] out traverses, that's really helpful. I love the area around Mongop State Park.

[01:24:38] That whole area right around, I think it was Longpond in the beginning of July

[01:24:44] was one of my favorite hikes out that way. We ran into this stand of cinnamon fern

[01:24:51] that were like, I mean, I'm kind of short, but it's still pretty impressive. They were up to my chin.

[01:24:57] So, you know, it's just amazing out there and a lot of those trails, I don't think you get the

[01:25:04] feeling of being in the wild like you do out in the Western Catskills. A lot of those trails

[01:25:11] felt more like herd paths and that was a really neat feeling. There were days,

[01:25:16] you know, I did quite a few with Yana recently, the last two years or two seasons. We would go all

[01:25:24] day and we wouldn't see another human. And I love that feeling of remoteness and that feeling

[01:25:29] of just being the only one out there. Yeah, I'll dig those comments in. The irony is,

[01:25:35] as you're doing the all trails challenge and sometimes if it weren't for the trail markers,

[01:25:41] you would not know you were on a trail. Yeah, exactly. Depending on the time of year,

[01:25:46] you know, the fern take over the entire area and it's beautiful, but it does get a little

[01:25:54] hairy out there. It's a little gnarly to try to figure out where you are. So thank God for

[01:25:59] trail markers. Yeah. And this is, you're talking about areas that are way far away from the

[01:26:06] popular areas. I mean, we even talk about Bel Air. When you're going up Bel Air, the any area

[01:26:11] over there has ferns up to your chest that you're like, am I on the right spot? And then you see

[01:26:17] a summit or like a trail marker like 50 feet ahead and you're like, okay, maybe I am. Let's

[01:26:22] plow through this. But I'm keeping on. Yeah. But that feeling of walking through those ferns

[01:26:29] besides thinking that you're going to get a tick on you. It just so absolutely phenomenal

[01:26:36] makes me feel that it's just so wild. Yes. I can't, that is one of the most, that's why I kind of hate

[01:26:45] maintaining my section because it has the ferns hanging over and I'm like, people should experience

[01:26:51] this because it's a feeling like no other that you're kind of like you're wild, you're out there,

[01:26:56] you're in the middle of wilderness. And I'm like, hey, people are contacting me like, hey,

[01:27:02] this is overgrown. I'm like, hey, shut the hell up. It's actually nice.

[01:27:08] Yeah. And I agree with you on that. Thank you for maintaining by the way. Thank you for that work.

[01:27:16] But yeah, I think trail maintenance is important, but don't overdo it.

[01:27:20] The part of getting into the woods and being out in the wilderness is having that feeling.

[01:27:26] You don't want the trails to be too pristine. Yeah, or you don't want them to be all rocks

[01:27:32] and tree roots because they're overused and heavily eroded. And it feels like you're just hiking up

[01:27:39] a riverbed, a dried up riverbed. Yeah. Yeah, no.

[01:27:45] Satad, what about you? You got any recommendations on your all trails challenge that you want

[01:27:49] to give out to hikers? Yeah, sir. So obviously, the Western Catskills has a special charm to

[01:27:56] it. And one of the trails out there that stands out is memorable for me. Let's see if Sarah

[01:28:02] has fond memories of hiking from Alder Lake out to Beach Hill Road along the Touch Me Not Trail.

[01:28:14] What's that? Yeah, I do. Yes.

[01:28:19] Yeah, that was... I'm going to say that's a very typical trail for the segment of a trail

[01:28:27] for the Western Cats. But I'll also throw high on my list is hiking from Mount Trimper along the

[01:28:36] Warner Creek Trail towards Plateau. That's beautiful. Yeah, that's... I like it out there.

[01:28:42] Yeah. And that's more in the central Catskills. It shows a little more foot traffic because

[01:28:50] it's in a more popular area of the Catskills, but man, it's just oozing with that Catskill charm

[01:28:58] and that experience. And the Warner Creek in and of itself is just a scenic place. So

[01:29:07] that's high on my list. And then so here I'll throw another one

[01:29:11] out there, which may or may not be part of the All Trails Challenge, but it's the Winter Cove Trail

[01:29:19] hiking out of the Winter Cove and up the escarpment. But then you bang a right...

[01:29:27] Yeah, then you bang a right along the escarpment to Jimmy Dolan Notch or the Jimmy Dolan Trail

[01:29:33] or Dutcher Trail going back down. Yeah, Dutcher Notch going back down. Yeah, first of all,

[01:29:40] that segment of the escarpment doesn't get a lot of traffic. It's got a couple great views along

[01:29:45] the way. Just highly recommend that. It's something that's... The escarpment is obviously

[01:29:52] in bounds, but that's just a unique area and that Dutcher Notch trail itself. I mean,

[01:30:02] the sensation or the mindset that hundreds, 100 years ago and more, that this was a means of

[01:30:13] thoroughfare for people with horses, ox carts, whatever they were using 100 plus years ago

[01:30:20] for transportation to get through that area. So I thought that was cool.

[01:30:25] You know the trail I love out in the... I mean, anywhere in that area you cannot go

[01:30:29] wrong, but I love that Mary Glen trail. And then you take it down to Ashley Falls.

[01:30:35] That's not a heartbreak for anybody who wants to just get a beautiful, beautiful hike in.

[01:30:42] That's a nice one. You can mix some loop. Even doing that... Yeah, doing that loop going up to

[01:30:48] I call ledge falls. I don't think they call it ledge falls and then continuing over to

[01:30:53] Newman's ledge and then artist rock, sunset ledge will give you a awesome perspective of the Catskills.

[01:31:01] It will give you kind of like the muddy perspective, the beautiful views perspective,

[01:31:05] and then like a little downfall core like sort of towards the sunset ledge and stuff like that.

[01:31:12] And it'll give you all perspective in a short little amount of time and the Catskills

[01:31:17] that'll just break you in to be like, wow, this is fun, offers views and it's not that long as well.

[01:31:26] Good point. Yeah. And one of the things that's also cool about that area is you...

[01:31:33] I don't know if it's anywhere else in the Catskills, but along that whole ridge or most of

[01:31:38] that ridge of the escarpment is you have that dwarf pine or pitch pine forest.

[01:31:44] Yes. Love that. Yeah, and you don't see that elsewhere. It's very similar to what we find in the gunks.

[01:31:53] Yeah. And piggybacking upon your Sarah's and Tad's spot of Warner Creek trail that is a phenomenon

[01:32:02] just upro going up to Trempor and such just gives you the whole different perspective of Catskills

[01:32:09] of kind of well-built trails that offer switchbacks, offer different forests,

[01:32:16] offer some steep climbs as well. But just it offers everything and everything that the Catskills has.

[01:32:22] Yeah, including nettles. Let's not forget the nettles because you are going to run into nettles

[01:32:28] along that trail. No, I never... Jess up the road in Warner Creek, I never ran into nettles

[01:32:34] at that. I did on my way down to Warner Creek heading kind of northeast from Trempor, I ran into

[01:32:41] nettles. Pushwackens? Yeah, well no, I was on the trail. Maybe they just searched me out.

[01:32:46] Maybe you have a certain immunity to nettles or you have like some special cream you got at

[01:32:51] Camp Catskill that gives you a barrier to nettle juice, but no, I going through there...

[01:32:59] Yeah, I definitely had too many close and personal encounters with my nettle friends.

[01:33:05] And I... I'll say nettles are the worst part of the all trails challenge.

[01:33:10] Because there are some areas that are thick with nettles. There are certain things that

[01:33:16] are just better to be done in the fall or very early spring. Yeah, or with full body armor on.

[01:33:23] Yes. Yeah, because they're right. So yeah, some of these nettles...

[01:33:27] Yeah, this time of year some of these nettles are so mature. You just looking at the stalks alone,

[01:33:33] they look like small hemlock trees. But the stalks are green, not brown.

[01:33:39] What does the other one call them? Field of screams.

[01:33:43] She called it the field of screams and that cracked me up through my fears.

[01:33:49] Yeah, the patch for the all trails challenge should just be in the shape of a nettle leaf.

[01:33:53] I like that idea. Oh, nice. That's actually a good idea. We'll have to present that.

[01:33:58] Yeah, we're going to copy and write that. We'll make some money off of that

[01:34:01] pay for new microphones. Yeah, right. So Sarah, any places that you were excited for,

[01:34:08] that you looked on the maps that you were like, oh, I can't wait to visit this area?

[01:34:12] Yeah, you know, I always say my favorite hike is the last one I took.

[01:34:16] And it's kind of the same thing. The most exciting hike is the one I'm planning for next.

[01:34:23] But yeah, I was really excited to do the Huckleberry Loop because I had heard

[01:34:29] wonderful things about that loop and I missed out on it because I was sick. So I had plans to go

[01:34:35] hike that with Yana and her friend, Kristen. And I wasn't feeling well. So I missed out on that.

[01:34:41] And it just seemed like every time I tried to plan it, I wasn't able to get to it.

[01:34:45] But it worked out well. I went in May and boy, it is gorgeous out there. The other one,

[01:34:52] I Tanbark Trail. That's a really neat little trail. It's very quick. But boy, that's got some

[01:35:00] really cool rock formations that I had heard about. You know, I wasn't really sure what to

[01:35:06] expect, but that's kind of a fun little hike too. As I was going to say, my most anticipated

[01:35:11] hike was the hike I got to do with my friend Michelle and her baby, Baby Boy Sarah.

[01:35:17] Michelle, how do you say her last name? Very old. Uncle Sarah. Yeah, Michelle Lutz.

[01:35:24] Lutz, yep. Yeah. What'd you do? We did Rochester Hollow. Nice. Yeah, that was a good one. And

[01:35:34] Baby Boy Sarah stayed awake the whole time. He's a rugged little hiker.

[01:35:39] She'd be a good one to have on the show if you want to talk about hiking with toddlers. That girl's

[01:35:44] got it. She got it down to a science. Let me tell you. I got a laugh at me because we actually

[01:35:53] hiked when he was, I think, two months old, yeah, around two months old. And I said to,

[01:36:01] when she asked me how the hike went and I said, well, it was pretty good. But

[01:36:04] you know, I was out hiked by a nursing mother. And then I followed up with she was literally

[01:36:10] nursing while hiking and she was still faster than me. I didn't know that was a requirement of the

[01:36:17] All Trails Challenge. It's a day. I know you better get on that. But she's wonderful. She's amazing.

[01:36:25] Ted, you're not going to complete that. Yeah, I just, wow, that just was so deflating. I was

[01:36:30] enthusiasm. And here I am. You have to hire a guide. You have to,

[01:36:35] you know, there's those babies. You know, that's basically what it is. Ted, any places you're

[01:36:43] excited for? Yeah, I'm just going to echo what Sarah said. It's the next hike

[01:36:48] is the one that's wetting my appetite. And I have a few more to do. So there's a lot

[01:36:56] more enthusiasm out there to finish this. But I will say it's been a worthwhile departure

[01:37:05] to spend some time away from what I think now are my old friends, the higher mountains and the

[01:37:10] Catskills hit these all trails. But I am looking forward to finishing off maybe another round this

[01:37:16] winter and the higher elevations here. Nice. Nice. So what about Sarah, the most dreadful hike

[01:37:27] that you've had? I would say hiking out to a quick lake. That whole area, it's funny. One of my

[01:37:36] favorites and one of my least favorites were out in the, what is it, the Willowymic? Willowymic

[01:37:46] intersecting trails, a lot of snowmobile trails, which can be the main of your existence, you know,

[01:37:53] because they're not all required for the challenge. And I got in and I went out there and she's a

[01:37:58] planner. She had it, she had it planned out. But as we are likely to do, we started to chit chat.

[01:38:08] And about a mile and a half down this trail, we realized we were covered in ground we had

[01:38:13] already covered. So we had to backtrack that extra mile and a half. So there was an additional three.

[01:38:22] So the day, the day in total was, it was a 20 mile day because previous prior to that,

[01:38:28] we had to pick up, I think it was two miles of trail we had missed out in that direction

[01:38:34] because it's so far you don't want to make that trip for two miles, right? So we thought

[01:38:40] we'll just tack it on. And it would have been a pretty manageable day until we had our little

[01:38:44] three mile detour. So yeah, by the end of the day, we had, we had put on about 19, 18 and a half,

[01:38:51] 19 miles hiking out to that lean to at Quick Lake felt like it was never going to end.

[01:38:57] When I tell you it was a sea of ferns, there was no trail. We were just bushwhacking through

[01:39:04] ferns, waist high ferns. And that was exhausting. And to think, you know, we made it to the lean

[01:39:12] to around four, four thirty and then we had to go all the way back and we made short work of

[01:39:17] the return trip. Thank God. But that was probably, that was probably the lowest point I've had

[01:39:25] with this challenge. Wow. That was a tough day. That was a really tough day. Beautiful.

[01:39:30] And that theme too is gorgeous. But I think we both were thinking about living there

[01:39:37] instead of hiking out. Yeah, that was a struggle. That's one, if you're going to do Quick Lake and

[01:39:44] you have not done that yet, I would say do that in November when all those ferns have kind of

[01:39:49] relaxed a little bit, maybe March or April would be a good time to do it.

[01:39:53] Yeah. There's times when those ferns can be absolutely beautiful and amazing and you can

[01:40:00] be grateful of it, but then there's other times when you're just like Jesus, one with the sand.

[01:40:04] That's it. And you know in the beginning I was like, oh, it's so beautiful. This is magic.

[01:40:08] You know, I'm high on life and about 40 minutes in that all changed.

[01:40:14] Because you're holding your hands above your head and you're just like,

[01:40:17] God damn my arms are getting crazy. But then everyone's going out the nettles would

[01:40:22] give us a break. So that was cool. So don't wear shorts while doing the All-Sharles challenge.

[01:40:29] I will agree with that. Don't wear shorts. And I wear shorts every time.

[01:40:34] To summer. I don't know why. I should learn. Learn a lesson.

[01:40:38] You got to have those dorky convertible pants that like I love those shorts.

[01:40:42] Yeah. But still you don't want to put them on. It takes too much time.

[01:40:46] You got to take off your shoe. You got to put on your the pants.

[01:40:49] You don't have to take off your shoes. You just, you need to learn the technique.

[01:40:54] There's a little technique to it. If we had this conversation last week when we were together,

[01:41:00] all those boring moments we had in solitude in the parking lot this weekend, I would have taken

[01:41:05] some time to teach you at the ripe old age of 42 how to put on a pair of pants, Dosh.

[01:41:11] It's about time you learned a basic skill like that.

[01:41:14] So, yeah. So, Ted, how about you? How about the most dreadful?

[01:41:20] So I can't say that my most dreadful all trails experience is associated with hiking a trail

[01:41:31] itself. What made it a dreadful experience were the mosquitoes that were the size of like some

[01:41:40] of the thumbs. And at one point I had so many mosquitoes swarming around my head. I kind of

[01:41:48] felt like I was working air traffic control at JFK, LaGuardia and Newark. It was just awful.

[01:41:55] I had just like these enormous flesh eating mosquitoes who, and I had some, my wife had

[01:42:02] got me some like all natural mosquito repellent. It was completely ineffective, right? And I would have,

[01:42:10] and I don't know if that was intentional on her part or not. I want to think that it was unintentional

[01:42:14] on her part. But at any rate, I was willing, and I was in my mind, you know, as your solo hiking,

[01:42:22] your mind can just race to the most extreme scenarios. And so I envisioned myself like spraying

[01:42:30] my body with 103% deat to get rid of these mosquitoes. But I didn't have any bug spray with me. And I was

[01:42:38] hiking out of Palinville up around the various trails in North South Lake, and I was going to hike

[01:42:44] out to Rip Van Winkle Hollow. And as I'm hiking up, and I haven't seen anybody for well over an

[01:42:50] hour, and you know, half of my face has been eaten off by these mosquitoes, I see this elderly

[01:42:55] couple. When I say elderly, I'm telling you they were, if they weren't in their 80s, they were so

[01:43:01] close, they were like a birthday or two away. And at first I'm like, what the fuck are they doing

[01:43:06] all the way out here? You know, but then I noticed that they're foraging, they're a little bit off

[01:43:13] the trail and the older man who was closer to me had a like a canvas bag around his neck,

[01:43:22] the strap of it around his neck. And he had been putting mushrooms into the bag and he sees me and

[01:43:27] he gradually stands up and he starts walking towards me, but he's looking in his bag and

[01:43:33] he's pulling out these mushrooms and he starts showing them to me. And all I'm thinking about

[01:43:38] is he's showing them to me as there isn't a mosquito around his head. He must have bug spray.

[01:43:45] So I'm waiting for a break, yeah, I'm waiting for a break in his monologue.

[01:43:50] So I can just say, hey buddy, do you have any bug spray? But he's going on, he's going on,

[01:43:56] he's looking at the mushrooms, he's showing me the mushrooms and then eventually

[01:43:59] he starts to look up and he looks towards me and without breaking like a word, he just has this

[01:44:07] look of horror come upon his face as he sees these mosquitoes swarming around me and

[01:44:14] landing on me and I'm trying to be composed but it's hard to be composed. He turns to his wife and

[01:44:18] he says to his wife, honey, get the bug spray. This man doesn't have any bug spray. And she does,

[01:44:25] she pulls out like this industrial can of deet, like off deet that she comes over with and she

[01:44:33] just sprays me with this. And I felt like I was taking a shower out in the woods, you know,

[01:44:37] getting like bathed and deet. And it was great for about the next three hours as I continued on this

[01:44:45] hike, I didn't have any mosquitoes around me. But then as I started to come back down the escarpment,

[01:44:51] the deet had worn off. And yeah, and there they were again, they had all revisited me to get like,

[01:44:58] you know, their second meal of the day. So I literally, I had one of those light windbreakers

[01:45:04] with me with the hood. And this was like, I'm going to say late July, early August.

[01:45:10] And so I put this windbreaker on with the hood wrapped around my face as close as I could,

[01:45:15] stash his thinking and it is true, I did not have a headnet with me. And I wish I did.

[01:45:21] So I like bundled myself up as best as I could, sprayed that natural product as you know,

[01:45:27] the rest of it on my face. So I smelled like some lemon eucalyptus treat or whatever.

[01:45:34] And hiked back to my car in like a complete state of misery, right? But unfortunately, you know,

[01:45:41] my, my face wasn't nibbled away beyond recognition. But yeah, that was my worst day. And I'll never

[01:45:47] forget that day with this guy showing me his mushrooms and then realizing that I didn't have

[01:45:53] any bug spray. And I was getting eaten alive in front of him. He had this like look of horror.

[01:45:58] And then he summons his wife to come over with the, with the deet. So yeah, that's it. That's it.

[01:46:03] It only, and I was only in therapy, I think for four or six weeks after that. But

[01:46:09] it's amazing what a professional therapist can do to get you over your trauma.

[01:46:13] It's funny how we spend so much of our time, you know, buying organic food and trying to

[01:46:19] be healthy and exercising and eating right and going to the doctor and taking our blood pressure

[01:46:25] medicines and whatever we need. But then the minute some mosquitoes come out, we will bathe

[01:46:30] ourselves in poison. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. That's a second thought. If there was a can of Agent

[01:46:36] Orange there. Yep. Yeah, it was so bad. Yeah. So that's, that was my horrific, my horrific

[01:46:43] memory during the Ultriles challenge. So now needless to say, I when I go out, I have

[01:46:49] different flavors of bug spray, just invent, you know, flavor number one doesn't work. I can go to

[01:46:55] number two and then I have the ultimate backup of industrial strength off. Don't use on children

[01:47:02] under the age of 25 causes genetic mutations. And I have the nets now. I have the headnet.

[01:47:10] I hope so. Yeah. A machete because they get that big. You can cut them with a machete.

[01:47:15] I love my headnet. They make fun suits. They make full on body suits. Yeah. Oh, yeah. I've seen

[01:47:22] those things before like for up in Alaska and stuff like that. Yeah. Absolutely insane. Yeah.

[01:47:27] We'll know me on the trail because I'll be dressed like the beekeeper.

[01:47:32] So Sarah, any unexpected events that you've come across doing the Ultriles challenge?

[01:47:40] Yeah. You know, my favorite, Yana of course with Yana, we were leaving a hike and it was out in the

[01:47:47] western Catskills. I can't remember exactly which one it was off the top of my head. But

[01:47:51] we see a deer on the side of the road and next to it is this little white dog. And as we get

[01:47:59] closer, we realize it's not a dog. It's a deer. There was a leucistic. I guess it's

[01:48:07] albino, a leucistic fawn. And they stood on the side of the road. We got some cool pictures

[01:48:13] and it was just its little eyes were black. There was just a little black ring around its eyes.

[01:48:18] But otherwise it was pure white. And I thought that was amazing. I love any time I have a

[01:48:25] wildlife encounter. It's a good day for me. But that was incredible. Yeah. That must have been.

[01:48:33] Yeah. That was really something to see. You know, another time we saw an eagle right on the side of

[01:48:38] you. We saw a lot of eagles, but this particular one was pretty cool. He just kind of sat in this

[01:48:42] dead tree and Yana's the birder. So she took out her camera. She got some amazing photos.

[01:48:48] And as we were walking back to the car, we found this little sign that indicated there was

[01:48:53] a survey marker just into the woods. So we kind of walked just past where the trees started and

[01:49:02] we found a little survey marker out in the middle of nowhere. So that was kind of cool.

[01:49:05] But yeah, it's just something special about it. Every time it seemed like every hike there was

[01:49:12] something unique or something different that we got to experience. Excellent. Yeah.

[01:49:18] And you know, that's the beauty of going out into these lesser known trails to experience something

[01:49:25] that the Catskills has to offer that you didn't expect. Especially when you travel, of course,

[01:49:32] through the higher peaks and stuff like that, it's just all well-pathed, well-paved,

[01:49:39] stuff like that. And then you deal with these... I mean, sometimes it's horrible with the nettles

[01:49:45] and the ferns and stuff, but then you get the appreciation of the forest. And you know, you

[01:49:50] bring the birds out there too because there are so few people who hike some of those trails.

[01:49:57] You see a lot more variety of birds. You actually get to see a lot of fledglings that

[01:50:01] you wouldn't see in the more populated areas. So yeah. Ed, how about you?

[01:50:07] Yo, for Sarah, that must have been pretty special to have somebody who was into birding.

[01:50:13] You know, all about these. Yeah, kind of gives you a whole new perspective and appreciation for

[01:50:19] the area that you're hiking in. But for me, unexpected things that I came upon, I mean,

[01:50:27] I'm just going to go back without retelling, but I'm just going to go back to running into this

[01:50:32] 78, 80-year-old guy in the middle of nowhere that saved me with that industrial bug spray

[01:50:39] because I just, you know, I hadn't seen anybody for quite a while. There was this old couple

[01:50:46] totally unexpected, but yeah, they had some bug spray. So call it trail magic.

[01:50:54] They saved my day. Yeah. So to be honest, I'm not going on this all trail

[01:51:01] of trailings and stuff, but I should be because I've gone a lot of trails, but

[01:51:05] some of the unexpected stuff that I've come across is how well some of these areas are maintained

[01:51:13] other than other areas. So you go on the Wilamia Mountain Trail from the Beaver Hill,

[01:51:18] and they have the only suspension bridge in the Catskills, which is absolutely phenomenal

[01:51:25] that I was just like, I was like unaware of them like, whoa, suspension bridge,

[01:51:31] what are we in over in freaking Asia? Like this is absolutely phenomenal. And other things like

[01:51:38] that, though I got to admit the Wilamia Trail going up the top of Wilamia was actually pretty

[01:51:43] well maintained and stuff. And it's not that difficult. It's actually not that bad.

[01:51:47] And then crossing the Beaver Hill, getting that feel of where fly fishers begin their journey

[01:51:54] to begin in the great fly fishing in the Catskills is just absolutely phenomenal.

[01:51:59] Yeah. So Sarah, have you driven up that road along the Beaver Hill? Cross Mountain?

[01:52:06] Oh my God. Cross Mountain.

[01:52:09] Yeah. No, I don't think it's the cross mountain. Cross Mountain is a horrible road.

[01:52:13] Yeah. Well, that's yeah, maybe that road is, but I'm talking about the road that goes

[01:52:18] right along the Beaver Hill. Is there a drop off?

[01:52:24] No, it's just this like never ending road that takes you out to the Balsam Lake

[01:52:30] parking area on the opposite side, you know, on more of like the southerly side of Balsam Lake

[01:52:40] Mountain. Right? That is, now would you agree with me that that is the most scenic road in

[01:52:46] the Catskills? So beautiful out there. Yeah. It's just draw dropping. Yeah. I mean,

[01:52:52] it's fantastic. I've been out at many, many times and cycled along it many times to height,

[01:52:59] to do like a point to point height. But yeah, that's kind of just you're talking about that.

[01:53:04] How about how can you talk about Cross Mountain? Have you been over Cross Mountain? Admit it,

[01:53:07] do you have it? Yeah, I cross mountain. I've been over Cross Mountain. Yeah. Well,

[01:53:12] how can you say that I've been over Cross Mountain when you have, it's terrifying.

[01:53:17] It's fucking absolutely insane. Really? I don't let me I'm gonna zero win and I'm gonna see

[01:53:22] if this Cross Mountain is as bad as you claim it to be. I don't believe this. I wound up going over

[01:53:29] Cross Mountain in November because I was a dummy. It was, oh my God, it was such a nightmare.

[01:53:37] I can't, I think I hiked Panther. I hiked something in the morning and I was like,

[01:53:41] you know, I wanted, I just want to grab Balsam, Balsam Lake Mountain. And I

[01:53:47] just hit in my GPS BLM, but it was the seasonal access. I just didn't even think about it.

[01:53:58] I didn't pay attention. I just in my GPS in my car, I hit the option because it was the last time

[01:54:06] I visited Balsam Lake Mountain. I went from that approach. And of course, I wound up going over

[01:54:12] Cross Mountain. And on my way up, I saw the sign saying, you know, seasonal closed. It was fine,

[01:54:19] but it was not fun. I was kicking off. Yeah, this is where we transition into a

[01:54:26] a commercial for a Jeep Wrangler. I've been over the Cross Mountain road many times and

[01:54:31] my trusty Jeep, not a problem. I was in a Dodge Caravan. Oh, wow. You're a real thrill

[01:54:38] seeker then because I would not do it at a Dodge Caravan. Did you have like a couple kids in the

[01:54:44] car seat in the back and groceries from Hanna Ferds? No, there was probably a juice box under the car.

[01:54:51] So I mean, if I got stuck, I probably found some goldfish. Yeah, you could live for a few weeks

[01:54:57] with this food between the seat cracks. Yeah. No, I actually, I'll try to send you a

[01:55:05] post I did of me driving Cross Mountain Road in the winter. Okay, please do because I was going out to

[01:55:11] Kelly Hollow. I was doing, I did that for Willow-Emech one time for a search and rescue and

[01:55:18] and driving in the Prius was absolutely horrifying. I'd rather drive

[01:55:22] Flatacill Mountain Road going down to Highlandville or Socrates and then I wouldn't

[01:55:30] anytime. Well, now that they've done it, but that was absolutely. And you know,

[01:55:34] what's that other mountain that you go up to? Barcaboom? No, going up north towards Hunter's

[01:55:41] Field. What is that? Jim, is it Jim Thorpe? Not Jim Thorpe. You go up to Hunter's Field

[01:55:49] Mountain. It's absolutely insane steep switchbacks that is just absolutely terrifying.

[01:55:54] On the road? Yeah, yeah. On the road. Oh man. I'll think of it sometime, but apparently you guys

[01:56:04] have never been up there. Pine Island? No, you're way north of Pine Island Mountain.

[01:56:10] Hunter's Field. I was going to say, give me one second. I'm apparently you guys have never

[01:56:16] been. Ashland Pinnacle? Well, it's right around there. Yeah.

[01:56:22] There's Partridge Road and right next to that, Hunter's Field. Jim Cleveland Road. You ever been

[01:56:28] up that? I don't know. I was down. I stopped it. I went down Jim Cleveland Road on my electric

[01:56:37] skateboard a couple of weeks ago. Okay. Please, please. You've never been up there before.

[01:56:44] No, I've been up there. There's like a new skateboarding group in the Catskills that

[01:56:48] I founded where the blue hole skateboarders and yeah, we went on that road. We've never

[01:56:55] been up there before. You do not. You're saying the BG Partridge Road was at it?

[01:57:00] No. No. So you guys have never been up there. So once you get up there, let me know and we'll

[01:57:05] talk about it. So Sarah, thank you for joining us tonight. And Ted, thank you for

[01:57:13] joining us and giving your little talk about the Ultra Challenge. Sarah has only like under

[01:57:18] six miles, under three miles to do. Ted, how much you have left? I told you, I'm going to have

[01:57:25] to get my accounting firm to go through the list and do the tabulation. I just mentally,

[01:57:31] I keep telling myself I'm inside of 15% to go and that's what's keeping me going is I can see

[01:57:37] the end without knowing where the end is. Okay. So Sarah, can you talk about your social media

[01:57:43] presence? Where can we find you on Instagram and Facebook about this? Yeah, I'm at the Scenic

[01:57:50] Group Guiding and Gear on Instagram. Scenic Group Guiding and Gear on Facebook. My personal

[01:57:57] Instagram is I'm not lost. You are with underscores in between each of those. And yeah.

[01:58:05] Happy, so happy to be here, Stush and Ted. Thank you so much for having me and that was a lot of fun.

[01:58:11] I appreciate it. Thanks for being our sponsor. Yeah, really appreciate it.

[01:58:15] I was just kidding about the views of the month club. You know, I love this show.

[01:58:21] Come on. I don't want to have her because I don't want to, I don't want to, you know,

[01:58:24] send you back to therapy for those four weeks. Let's graduate.

[01:58:28] Let's not forget what you promised to do at the end of the show. We've reached that moment.

[01:58:34] Oh yeah, so I'll give it a second. Post-hike bruise and bites. Mary teacher

[01:58:41] us did this suggestion. What do you have suggested for us? Oh, post-hike bruise and bites.

[01:58:48] I love a good Stewart's Pizza. I mean, I'm kind of lowbrow.

[01:58:53] I know you're looking for where was it that we just, oh, give me the name of the brewery

[01:59:01] out by is a hunter brewery. What is the brewery out by the devil's path?

[01:59:08] Oh, the top of the kind of like the notch, the Noel area.

[01:59:13] Yeah. Oh, you got me on that one. It was good. It was so good.

[01:59:19] I feel really messy. It's too, it's too popular.

[01:59:28] Oh, well, West kill is very popular. Got it. Hold on one sec. I know what you're talking about.

[01:59:35] Oh shit. It's right at top of the knoll. And then when you go into the notch,

[01:59:41] it's right there. It was, you know, Hunter Mountain Brewer.

[01:59:45] What was it? I guess it's Hunter Mountain Brewer.

[01:59:49] Yeah, Hunter Mountain Brewer. What did I just say? You could see Hunter from it.

[01:59:52] Yeah, that's it. Sorry, Anna. I'm not lost. You are. That's me.

[02:00:03] I'll go guiding with her. Yeah. Yeah. Any day, any day. Awesome.

[02:00:08] I will definitely treat you on the scenic route and I promise it will be found eventually.

[02:00:13] Excellent. So, Sarah, now is the time where you roll down the windows of your car.

[02:00:17] Yeah. And you give us your loudest, you give us your loudest mountain lion roar.

[02:00:22] I don't think I can do it. I think the best I got for you is, well, that's about I do.

[02:00:27] That's good enough. That was what I heard at the 100 out episode.

[02:00:31] It's hot in this car. So, you know, I heard that more than Ted heard that because Ted didn't

[02:00:38] show up. I was out hiking with Danny. So, that's a hard

[02:00:41] invite to say no to it. That was a good day. That was a really awesome event.

[02:00:46] Sarah, what time did the podcast happen? It happened at like 3 p.m. So, anybody who's not

[02:00:51] done their hike at 3 p.m. is very sad and very old. You can call me sad and old.

[02:01:00] That's fine. I was hiking. Was it good time? That was good enough for me. Yeah.

[02:01:05] So long as I can hike, it's still good. So, no, thank you.

[02:01:09] Sarah, thank you for joining us tonight. Really appreciate it. Your perspective on the All Trails

[02:01:14] Challenge. It's great. Everybody should get out there and enjoy it. Also, check out Scenic

[02:01:19] Route Guided. Amazing that you have been a sponsor of the show for this long, especially

[02:01:23] after this much, what do I say? Tab, what's the word? I don't know.

[02:01:31] This is struggling and, you know, I don't know what the word is.

[02:01:38] Yeah, we've just been struggling along here. I'm a proud sponsor. You guys have done great work.

[02:01:45] Well, thank you so much for joining the show and thank you so much for

[02:01:49] taking your time and joining us tonight. So, hope you have a good night. Be safe, drive safe.

[02:01:54] Yes, thank you very much. You guys have a good one. All right, you too. Have a good night.

[02:01:57] Bye-bye. Bye.

[02:02:29] Remember this. You gotta just keep on living in the Catskills, man.

[02:02:36] L-I-V-I-E. Wicked, wicked, wicked, wicked.