01/05/2024
SUUUUUUPER LATE & LONG POST!!! Happy New Year Hood Hikers!!!! Forgive me for my hiatus, I have been adjusting to motherhood & a new job. My life is so drastically different from just a year ago so please be patient. I miss you all so much! I miss the trees, I miss the mountains, and I miss the trails. I miss taking everyone out of the city and escaping all of our worries and troubles together. With all the slaughter happening globally and all of our local daily plights, I know we all need an escape now more than ever. I promise I will be pulling up in a rental van to whisk you away to an adventure very soon! For now, enjoy these photos from our last hike and read on for story time and upcoming events.
Story time!
Let's chat about our last hike, our Halloween Hike, that went down in October. I encountered some obstacles! First, it was unseasonably warm, which brought out the MASSES!!! So much so that the parking lot was full by the time we arrived. My good parking juju saw to it that we landed a great parking spot but some of our hikers that met us on the trail were not so lucky. I had to coordinate meeting folks at a parking lot a little ways away and getting them to the trailhead, which delayed our start, a little warm up pre-hike if you will lol The trail was more crowded than we're used to but the group was amazing and made the best of it. Shout out to the French Guy costume that won the costume contest.
Then came the post hike activities. We decided to enjoy some delicious local ice cream, and so did everyone else, the line was endless. While waiting on the line, this new breastfeeding momma had exceeded her time limit for pumping. So here we are, nowhere near NYC, or my breast pump, with my baby feeders about to combust. I didn't anticipate us being gone for so long so I didn't properly prepare and failed to bring along my manual pump.
***WARNING, graphic breastfeeding details to follow*** This resulted in me waiting for bathrooms in the local shops that were overflowing with crowds, and manually expressing milk into the sink, which provided only brief relief. The drive back to the city was excruciating, I was in so much pain and desperately needed to get the milk out. As soon as I dropped off the Hood Hikers, I was expressing milk into a plastic bag smh.
Anyway, I survived (barely) but best believe I will never leave my pump again! This traumatized me and made me realize I had to slow down with my return to guiding trips. Especially since the following week I started a new full time job in Bk, which is a pretty trash commute from my home. The new job, in a far away land, was a necessary sacrifice I had to make as a single mom. Speaking of which, major shout out to my own mother who has been helping me tremendously by watching my mini Hood Hiker while I work and lead hikes. She is truly the real MVP. Thanks for reading all about my saga lol I share all of this so you can understand my absence and be patient with me as I get into this new flow.
We still have some exciting things coming up.
First, our 3rd annual New Year photo contest! Submit a photo you personally shot while on a hike with us for your chance to win $200! It can't be a photo that you have submitted in previous contests. DM me your photo by Sunday, January 7th to enter the contest. I will post all of the entries on Monday and the photo with the most likes by 8pm on Thursday, January 11th wins!
Second, join us for our 3rd annual Black History Month Hike on Sunday, February 11, in collaboration with our dear friends at Trials, Trails and Triumphs and TriState Hikers ! I will post about the hike again in the near future. You can register at https://www.t3hikes.com/ Unfortunately, I can not provide transportation for this event.
Finally, to wrap up this insanely long post, the finalized version of the doc Concrete Bushes by the brilliant folks at Scene8Productions is available so go check it out here https://vimeo.com/899620857 I'll dedicate a separate post to the film and the screening we had.
I want to thank you all for your continued support and patience! I hope to see you on the trail soon!
