McConnell's Mill Hike

Me thinks that the moment my legs begin to move, my thoughts begin to flow.

~Henry David Thoreau

Everywhere is walking distance if you have the time.

~Steven Wright

Kurt is turning me into the outdoors guy I always wanted to be. I don't think he's doing it intentionally, because I have to shove him out the door most time we go on an outing, but he's giving me the reason to do all the hiking and backpacking and camping I liked doing and thought I'd keep doing.

While I was over in the desert this last trip, Laura sent me an e-mail about going to Philmont. Philmont Scout Ranch in New Mexico, is pretty much the Mecca for scouts. I'm sure there are other important places you can go and claim to have visited, but if you mention doing Philmont to anyone who has ever been a Boy Scout, you've pretty much said you've done THE scout thing.

Kurt wants to go, and the local council has a bunch of openings, so Laura suggested that I go along too; we can train and get ready for the adventure together. I couldn't think of one good excuse not too, and when I asked my boss at work for the time off, he quickly said "YES!" (Turns out HE was an Eagle Scout...)

So we need to get out on the trail. We visited REI outfitters and found a couple of nice packs on sale (the first real packs we've ever had), but needed an opportunity to try them out. My month has been jam-packed since I got back, and so has Kurt's; but we found a Sunday morning to go out together.

We drove up to McConnell's Mill State Park which is a gorge along Slippery Rock Creek just about 20 minutes north of the house. Easy to get to, and filled with trails, I figured it would be a great starter hike for us. I got on-line and found a 3.5 mile hike down one side of the creek and back up the other with lots of rocky ground and a couple of steep hills, just what the doctor ordered to see how the equipment felt first time out.

The weather was gorgeous and we got on the trail about 9 a.m. It was a fairly cool morning, so sweatshirts worked for proably the first 3/4 of mile, then got to be a bit much. The trail is part of the North Country Trail system, so on the way down it was marked with blue blazes and easy to see. The Creek was gorgeous in the early morning light, and we stopped for a rest at McConnell's Mill about the 3/4 mile point. The rest of the hike to the turn around bridge was right along the creek, just above the rapids and huge rocks that were depostited from the every edge of the last glacier to push this far south.

At the bridge we stopped and watched the local EMT teams practice river rescue techiques and had some chow. Then it was back up on the trail headed back. The trip back seemed to go a bit faster, though we were used to the hiking by this point, and since we had a time crunch with Kurt's musical practice later in the day, we hurried a bit faster than on the way down.

One of the unusual things we notices was several mill stones cast along the hillsides above the creek. Some were quite high up, and quite far down the creek for the Mill, so I wonder if there might not have been more than one mill on the creek.

All in all it was a fun day, and a great chance for Kurt and I to share some quality "guy" time in the great outdoors. We should experience lots of that in the next 7 months or so!