Do you remember when......?

[Mad Townie]

The good, the bad . . .

When the Nesowadnehunk gate was still open?

When lots of hikers would sit around the campfire in the evening . . . and have a couple cigarettes?

When the first guy in town bought a snowmobile?

When your choice of snowshoes was bear paw or beaver tail, but only wood and rawhide?

Before polypro?

When winter jackets had fur (like, from animals) around the hood?

When your sweater, mittens, socks and balaclava were all knitted by your mother?

 

[jade]

I remember when in elementary school girls were not allowed to wear pants so we had to walk the mile to school (and back) in stupid little dresses...arriving at school with tiny frozen red legs....(beginning of my feminist leanings.....)

When I'd bring one metal canteen with a shoulder strap for a day hike--it was covered with a flannel material and weighted about 6 pounds--empty! Used it later for Boonesfarm and Tango so not a total waste.....

When packs were available with exterior frames ONLY and sat about two feet above you head.....

When sleeping bags rolled up to a 30" by 36" cylinder tied with cotton strings....

When Olympic hopefuls lived on a mountainside in Eastern Europe, worked to feed a family of 10 seven days a week, rode a tractor with metal wheels to the stadium, were true amateurs, won the gold and later used it as teeth for the whole family.....

Stingray bikes with a banana seat and solid rubber tires--purchased used, of course--we would ride from one end of town to the other and be home before the street lights came on....

When a hike to Monadnock meant wearing jeans and a cotton sweatshirt, white sox and desert boots ....in 1967???

When swearing in front of adults would get you sent to reform school.....

When there were no hiking forums to share this stuff with other enthusiasts...

I remember Barbara Billingsley before she learned to speak jive.....(and when words like golly and swell were popular with the Beav)....

When dogs were named Spot, Lady, Princess and Rusty and roamed the neighborhood freely....

If you slipped and fell on a neighbor's property they would apologize, bake you a cake and that would be the end of it.....

When it costs $16 to stay at the Crawford Notch bunk house--complete with the stinkiest outhouse in the world!!

When I had a skinny little waist and could eat anything I wanted!!!

When Cassius Clay fought Sonny Liston--the whole neighborhood joined to watch it on a tiny black and white tv....

When I used to have to pee only 2-3 times per hike...up to 20-30 now....

 

[SherpaKroto]

When you had your choice of shelter 1, 2 or 3 in the Great Gulf...
The first time I entered the Great Gulf "Wilderness"...
When that trail started at Dolly Copp...
When Trident Col Shelter and the hike to it was one of the prettiest places you could go to (shelter is gone, and you now would go through a landfill)...
Berlin's Paper Mill was aptly called "Brown Company"...
Many summer days were spent playing ball until someone would hit it into the river...then we'd pool our resources, send someone across the Bridge to Western Auto to buy a new one, and do it all again...
Logs were floated down the Androscoggin...
Moose were a rare site...
No one ever heard of a coy-dog...
When "high-tech" meant hunter's wool...
Your first Vibram soles...
Your Svea...
Buying them both at 3:00 AM (or thereabouts) at LL Bean's old green building...
Millinocket, Rumford and Berlin were boom towns...
The Nansen Ski Club hosted a winter carnival, attracting the best jumpers in the world...

I disagree with Kevin re: weather closings. In 1969 most of the month was spent with school closings. The truant officer would drive around making sure that any kid caught playing in the snow had shoveled his house off. Berlin received 200 inches of snow that February. My cousin Norm Boucher(Goalie for Notre Dame HS) was killed when the Noter Dame Arena collapsed during a game. When you lived in northern NH, there were plenty of weather school closings.

 

[timmus]

..you were considered as an eccentric by your friends and family because vacation meant camping and hiking

 

[Dennis C.]

Remembering when ...

.... swimming was legal at Sabbaday Falls off the Kanc Hwy. I have photos while sliding down the upper smooth rock chute into the pool (just before the 30-40 foot waterfall drop). We'd also duck under one of the lower falls into an open small cave like area where you'd be able to watch the water rushing by you (1970).

 

[kltilton]

I never got to see Franconia Notch pre-highway. I do remember going up there though when I was 4 or 5 years old when my mom would drive my dad to work up there on the road construction crew at some ungodly hour. Does anyone have pictures of the notch before the highway? I think my dad has some of the construction somewhere.

 

[RoySwkr]

There were a lot more leantos in the Greens & Whites (Buffum, Fay Fuller, Deerview, Camp 9, 13 Falls, Isolation, Desolation) and staying there was free

 

[Peakbagr]

When Pete Fish still patrolling the High Peaks. A Ranger presence in the backcountry that enforced hiking backwoods etiquette and safety, and actually hiked around there.

Cannisters on the ADK HPs.

Snowbird and Little Marcy leantos.

When the former Elk Lake owners didn't mind hikers on Boreas, Sunrise and Wolf Pond Mtns in the winter.

When a big crowd in the High Peaks was about 1/3 of that same description today.

When the W46 pretty much meant breaking most of your own trail.

The woods before the last couple of hurricanes.

When Sierra Designs, The Northface and Kelty were all small companies making handmade, top quality gear.

 

[bruno]

When Sierra Designs, The Northface and Kelty were all small companies making handmade, top quality gear.

anyone remember holubar? them wuz my boys back in the day fo' sho'! when i was in school in boulder colorado, their down jackets and sleepin' bags was da shizzle!

or the ski hut in berkeley, ca.?

word!

 

[Kevin Rooney]

I disagree with Kevin re: weather closings. In 1969 most of the month was spent with school closings. The truant officer would drive around making sure that any kid caught playing in the snow had shoveled his house off. Berlin received 200 inches of snow that February. My cousin Norm Boucher(Goalie for Notre Dame HS) was killed when the Noter Dame Arena collapsed during a game. When you lived in northern NH, there were plenty of weather school closings.

Aw SK, you Berliners were just wussies. I was in HS in the 60's, and our school bus (we had to pay the driver as the town would pay the tuition but not the bus fare) route was about 15 miles, partly along back roads between Pittsfield, Stockbridge and Bethel, Vermont. The school bus owner/driver was a tough old woman who used to drive a logging truck, so a school bus was easy by comparison. We got the same amount of snow as Berlin - just tougher I guess!

Sorry to hear about your cousin, though.

Kevin

 

[Tuggy]

We used to throw our gear in the center of our sleeping bag, roll it lengthwise, tie the two ends together, slip it over our shoulder, and call it a horseshoe pack. Oh yeah gas was 20 cents a gallon, bread was 7 loaves for a buck, smokes were a penny a piece, and money could always be had by collecting pop bottles..

 

[Grumpy]

. . . I was in HS in the 60's, and our school bus (we had to pay the driver as the town would pay the tuition but not the bus fare) route was about 15 miles, partly along back roads between Pittsfield, Stockbridge and Bethel, Vermont. The school bus owner/driver was a tough old woman who used to drive a logging truck, so a school bus was easy by comparison. . . .

This one brought back some memories . . .. We were townies when I Attended school in Northfield, VT during the 1950s, and so we walked, regardless of the weather. It was a classic "uphill both ways" walk, too, literally, because of where our house and the schools were situated.

G.

 

[jn316]

Well, it looks like among the benefits of aging are some good memories.
I've enjoyed reading all of these.

And it prompts a few more for me....
like how the Tripyramid slide loop was one of the quickest half-day hikes, scooting up the N. slide and sliding down the south, back to the VW that I could drive all the way to the loop jct.

and there was sorta a trail up Raymond Cataract

and how the Gale River Trail and Greenleaf trail crossed recent landslides

and, to go along with the memories of snowy '69, the avalanche that swept down Lion Head, right across the Tuck Trail. These days if the hike up from Pinkham doesn't make me feel old, seeing how all the trees in the slide path have grown back sure does!

 

[KayakDan]

I remember when Lincoln was a gas station,a restaurant,and the building where Steve Smith's is-no condos,the Kanc was "closed" in winter,and you were leaving civilization if you dared to drive it anyways.

Remember when the swankiest restaurant in No. Conway was Barnaby's Steak House?

 

[Neil]

I remember when...

you could read about hiking on VFTT.


Hahaha! Jjust kidding

Keep it coming, old guys.

 

[--M.]

Yes, I remember...

Interminable visits to the "Yield House" in North Conway village. Even decades later, the whole thing makes no sense to me.

Riding those little cars up the Cranmore tram.

"My first hike" with my Dad & brother somewhere on Carrigain.

"My first Ammonoosuc hike" with my Dad and sister: tenting barely off-trail about 2/3 of the way up in an orange A-frame, descending the next morning in Keds and snow. Croo trail-running big wooden-framed packs in laps past us. Dad's pack was wood & canvas, too.

Yeah, I miss the cartilage, but we must look forward, no?

 

[Mr. X]

There were no conga lines on Lincoln-Lafayette, you didn't have cell phone yackers loudly talking on every popular summit.

yeah, hang up and hike!

 

[arghman]

:envy: I didn't start hiking until 1999 or so.
miniver cheevy, born too late...

 

[Mr. X]

:envy: I didn't start hiking until 1999 or so.
miniver cheevy, born too late...

I haven't even started hiking yet. I'm still waiting for that magic listing in the trail conditions segment of the site. Right...

 

[erugs]

I am ancient enough to remember many of the old days mentioned above, especially drinking from minor streams if we got there before the dogs settled in and stirred up too much mud, the Edmonds Col Shelter that smelled like stale pee and the fire tower on top of Osceola. Jade -- you're so right about frozen legs from wearing skirts and dresses on the walk to/from school being a life-changing memory. I'm not going to be fashionable if it compromises being comfortable.