Conquering a mountain

Location: 43°24’5”N 72°43°0” W Summit Okemo Mountain, Ludlow, VT, USA

Driving a Land Rover (of the color orange I might add) up a mountain in the dark with fog droplets misting your sight is both as thrilling and as terrifying as it sounds. I loved it. The truck moved stubbornly to the summit, occasionally stumbling over rocks and roots, and made strange noises as it ran over rocks and slushed mud over to the sides. After a while we reached a section that you knew just by looking at it would cause trouble. After five attempts we finally made it passed the muddy section with giant boulders sticking up, but I was too concerned with glancing over my side where there was a drop off to notice that we actually made it passed this tricky section. It had been warm and sticky all week, but at the top of the mountain it was a bit chilly and windy. The ski patrol cabin looked lonely and deserted and the lodge had some lights turned on as if trying to invite people who it knew wouldn’t show up. At least not until the snow arrives. In a town where life is all about skiing the mountain is deserted up until the season starts. Before then the people hide away in local pubs and cabins chatting away about winters past and new equipment rumors. Being a person that knows absolutely nothing about either of these two topics I find myself trying to pull off the bluff of being well informed but a little too shy to engage in the conversation. Everyone assumes that I am in the “ski industry” and I let them. Apparently my Swedish Lundhags outdoors pants look like high-end snow pants, which appear to add to my credibility of being someone who knows what they are talking about. Or rather, not talking about. It figures; the only way for me to be fashionable is by mistake.

#landrover #vermont #okemo #usa