It started last Thursday when I was invited by Adirondack Hamlets to Huts to help celebrate the 100th anniversary of the Northville-Lake Placid trail. Adirondack Hamlets to Huts is a fine little organization, developing a community-based system to hike, paddle and bike through the Adirondacks without necessarily having to camp. As they like to say, “Adventure by day. Comfort at night.” The idea was to join folks for a day hike coupled with glamping (glamorous camping) and fine dining at the Inn on Piseco Lake.

Tornados had passed through the previous night, taking out utility poles, knocking trees onto houses and causing all kinds of havoc. It discouraged all our clients except our hardiest one, Leigh Ann Smith of Saranac Lake, from joining us on an eight mile hike from what is known as Whitehouse on the West River Road in Wells to the Inn on Piseco Lake. At 8:30 Thursday morning, Adirondack Hamlets to Huts visionary Joe Dadey; Bill Farber, the man who knows more about the workings of Adirondack local government than anyone, and I headed down the NPT with Leigh Ann.

The first two miles were easy going, but then we ran into blowdown. Not just your occasional tree, but entire swaths of them. Swaths a half-mile wide and a mile long. Trees piled on top of each other 20-feet high. Fortunately, the trail itself had only short sections of blowdown. There, I had to get down on my hands and knees to crawl under one tree and then crawl over another. It was a slow, sometimes discouraging process. I can only imagine what it would be like for a novice hiker, because sometimes even we couldn’t find the trail. Other than the blowdown, though, the trail was easy and the terrain gentle.

We got to the Inn on Piseco Lake early enough to relax in our extravagant glamping tent before dinner. Quite a contrast to hiking the trail years ago when I camped in my lightweight backpacking tent and slept on my Therm-a-Rest pad.

Bill Farber and Jack Drury on the trail. (Photo provided)

After a delicious dinner of salmon, wild rice and zucchini, and a good night’s sleep, I raced home for another outdoor adventure. What was that, you ask? It was my 10-year-old granddaughter June’s completing her quest to be an Adirondack 46er. She and her mother had decided to finish their effort on Rocky Peak Ridge, the same peak where I had completed the same challenge many years ago. I was thrilled to be invited, but a little concerned how I might hold up. It turns out I had reason to be.

I came home from the NPT hike, showered, restocked my daypack, set the alarm for 4:30 and went to bed. The plan was for June’s dad Will and I to hike up the shoulder of Giant Mountain, then hike over to Rocky Peak Ridge. Where, we’d meet June and her mother, who’d camped below the summit the previous night. From there we’d hike down the ridge to their awaiting car.

At first everything went according to plan. Will and I got on the trail by 5:15 and made slow but steady progress. I’ve never been a fast hiker, but that was never a problem because, like the hiker who doesn’t have to outrun the bear, just his companions, as an outdoor leader I only had to be faster than my slowest hiker.

I’ve hiked Rocky Peak Ridge a couple of times and enjoy going from west to east, because I get the steepest elevation done in the first half and it’s nearly all downhill on the second. What I didn’t count on was that I’m 18 years older than the last time I hiked it. Going up was slow but steady. Will was patient and let me set the pace. We met June and Meg on the summit at 9:30 and I was feeling great. We celebrated June’s accomplishment with photos and a banner, then headed down.

That’s when I started feeling my age.

I’ve been lucky that for my entire hiking career my knees had never bothered me … until Saturday. I’d left my hiking poles at home and by lunchtime my knees started acting up. It started with a twinge in my left knee, which turned into a constant pain. Eventually it spread to my right knee. Before long, it was just a continuous throbbing of both. It could have been the 11-mile distance, the 4,300 feet of ascent or the 5,200 feet of descent, but my guess is that it was the combination of all three.

As the pain increased, I got angry with myself for not bringing my trekking poles. With each mile the pain got worse, and with four miles to go I was hobbling like Grandpa Amos of the Real McCoys. By then I’d also finished my second water bottle.

As I fell farther and farther behind, they took notice. They were incredibly patient with this old guy. They waited, they shared their snacks and water, lent me trekking poles, and they waited some more. By early afternoon with three miles to go my knees were on fire and I’d slowed down from three miles an hour to about one. June was a gem. Whenever I fell too far behind, she waited for Poppy.

I finally stumbled into the parking lot feeling like I had just crossed the Mojave Desert with a refrigerator on my back. All I could think of was stopping at Stewarts for a refreshing drink and a coffee milkshake, which I soon did.

So, what was the hardest part of the entire hike? Not the pain, not the physical fatigue, not even the mental fatigue. It was that for 50 years I’ve been the outdoor care provider, but now I was the one being provided for.