Mount Monadnock

According to Wikipedia:

"Mount Monadnock, or Grand Monadnock, is the most prominent New England mountain peak south of theWhite Mountains and east of the Massachusetts Berkshires, and is the highest point in Cheshire County, New Hampshire. It has long been known as one of the most frequently climbed mountains in the world.

At 3,165 feet (965 m), Mount Monadnock is nearly 1,000 feet (300 m) higher than any mountain peak within 30 miles (48 km) and rises 2,000 feet (600 m) above the surrounding landscape."

Now, coming from Colorado, this really doesn't seem impressive, or daunting, or even worth the effort:), however, some friends were going up and this seemed like a great opportunity to spend some time with Jaden...so, he and I decided to go up.  

Saturday morning we were up early and ready to go.  We started on the road trip by 8:15, and started the climb by 10:15.

We probably would have gone slightly faster up, but we lost one of the people in our group and he needed to turn back before we were even 30 minutes into the hike.

Now, I will say that with me being as out of shape as I am, the mountain still wasn't challenging, but it was a good and enjoyable hike.  I still felt it in the legs a little the next day and I think Jaden did an incredible job.  He had plenty of energy and was always at the front of the pack needing to be reigned in to stay with the group.

This picture is about 2/3rds of the way up after one of several "false summits".  The views were great and we had fantastic weather for the whole day...not too hot, with a breeze, slightly overcast and no rain until about 5 minutes away from the car!

This is Jaden at the summit.  We ate lunch took some pictures and then headed back.  Going up ended up taking just around 2 hours.  After taking a different and longer path down, we were back at the car and on our way home.  The drive was close to 2 hours, and yet we were home before 5pm and still had time to attend a birthday party.  That is a good day :)






Thanks to my son who made the trip with me and who made me proud with his great climbing!  Love you Jaden!