For years I've enjoyed hiking the Ice Beds Trail, in the White Rocks National Recreation Area, and I've spent many hours gazing meditatively up at the collapse slopes.  I've always wanted to hike up to the summit and look down, but the trail looked too steep for my knees.  However, this week I learned that the trail actually wraps around the back side -- it's part of the Appalachian Trail (the "AT") and the Long Trail (the "LT") and isn't too aggressive.  [Grain of Salt moment -- the friend who told me this mountain bikes every week, and snowboards down the Mount Ascutney Summit Road every winter.]  Well, today's weather was Autumn perfect, so I took the plunge, so to speak, and decided today that's where I was going to be.

The morning, the trail, and the ascent couldn't have been better!  I made the summit overlook in 2h15m, covering 2.82 miles of trail, and climbing 1100 feet from the parking lot!  The view back down towards that vista on the Ice Beds Trail was amazing... almost 1000 feet (see photo #6) and the clean break along the fracture was pretty spectacular too (photo #7).  I'm tired, achy in the knees, but when they ask me at work, "Where Do You Want to BE?"  I was there, today.

Over the course of this and last summer, I have been biking the Northern Rail Trail, which runs from Lebanon NH across Grafton and Merrimack Counties to just north of Concord NH.  The latest section opened this summer in Boscawen, extending the route by 4 more miles, and almost reaching to Concord's northern city limit.  As we are forming a group of hiking and biking trail enthusiasts at work, I noticed that our map data did not include this latest section.

I raced out early one Friday, hoping to bike and GPS the new section before the sunset took away the light and warmth.  The rail bed had been graded and covered with a layer of stone dust, making for a nice soft riding surface.  I made it to the end, captured some photos, and then made it back to my car before lights were needed to see the way.

The previous weekend, I revisited the peak section of the rail trail:  Orange Heights.  986 feet above sea level, the trail passes over the divide between the Connecticut and Merrimack river drainage systems.

A few weeks ago, I had the opportunity to spend a week working with my field team in Michigan.  My work at TomTom involves coordinating project work across the North Central USA.  I've not had a chance to work with a field team before, so this was an exceptional opportunity to meet my field colleagues and to see how challenging their work really is.  Our Region Manager arranged for the entire field staff, our manager, our quality coordinator, and myself, to work together to survey the cities of Lansing and Kalamazoo, in south-central Michigan.  Our base of operations for that week was the small city of Marshall -- an absolutely quaint and enjoyable place - near the junctions of Interstates 69 and 96, and convenient to both cities.

While our hotel had no usable internet access, the city did have a wonderful brewpub and a first-class hiking trail along the Kalamazoo River.  The Marshall Riverwalk - along the banks of the Kalamazoo River - is elevated, illuminated, and ideally suited for folks who want to jog, walk, or bird, over the river's banks, any time of day or night.  Tom Byker (from Indianapolis) and I jogged/birded along the Riverwalk twice during the week.  The pre-dawn gloom was lit by overhead LED 'street lights', and the walkway network included little protrusions out over the river, offering views upstream and downstream; birds included mallards, a great-blue heron, cedar waxwings, and the usual woodland birds.

On one day, I was riding with Brian Hess (from Cincinnati) and I worked in the county to the west of Lansing.  We found a wonderfully peaceful meander in the Grand River, and passed a few minutes taking in the tranquil, quiet setting.   A short time later, Brian spotted a flock of Sand Hill Cranes on the edge of a cornfield!  They took off before I could get my camera powered up and in focus, but they were a magnificent sight to behold.