Day 1 at Mt.Cardigan Trip

The day of our Mount Cardigan trip finally arrived. I was all packed and ready for this adventure. When we got to the school, I put my bags on the big trailer. Then, I said goodbye to my mom and met up with my friends. When I got on the bus, I sat next to Riley L and Olivia C. The bus ride seemed to go on forever. Mount Cardigan is in the region of Orange and partially in Alexandria New Hampshire. We took the routes of I-89 N and US-4 to get there. It took us about 1 hour and 10 minutes to get to the lodge.

Once we arrived at the lodge, we played a game that was kind of like a version of dodgeball. People were chosen to play as either predators or prey. The predators threw the ball at the prey, and the prey tried to get away. If you were hit by the ball, you became a predator. The ultimate goal was to be the last one as prey. I was not the last one as prey because I was really bad at dodging the ball! But, it was a really fun activity. After another game, we had lunch. I had a turkey sandwich on pita bread. I also had peanut butter crackers and goldfish for a snack. After lunch, we were showed to our room. I was roomed with Hadley R, Loren C, Olivia C and Riley L. Loren was on the top bunk above Hadley and Olivia was on the top bunk above Riley. I took the top bunk and did not have anyone under me. Therefore, we stored our bags on the bottom bunk below me. I really liked our room and loved that I was with all my best friends.

After getting our room situated, we went out for our first hike. In my group, I had Olivia C, Riley L, Fiona W, Ryan B, Julia B, Josh D, Sean E and Peyton M. I really liked our group because we were not fast hikers, nor slow. About 45 minutes into the hike, we stopped and played a game. This game was called the Closepin Find. Basically, Toby, our leader, hid a very small and a large clothespin in one tree. We played multiple rounds of this game. Whoever found the closepins first, would win the round. Julia kept finding the clothespins. It was amazing. Then, we stopped to sketch the trees, leaves, and the other natural surroundings in our journals. Next, we continued our hike to Welton Falls. Welton Falls is a national park on its own region area. We stopped several times to get there and back to fill our journals with nature pictures. Welton Falls is a very beautiful waterfall. After we sketched Welton Falls, we headed back to the lodge. That hike was only about 2 miles in total.

When we got back to the lodge, we had dinner. Everyone had spaghetti and meatballs, bread rolls, and salad. For dessert we had vanilla ice cream and brownies. I enjoyed both the dinner and the dessert. I did not realize how hungry I was after hiking all day! After dinner, we went on a night hike. On the night hike, we did not need any flashlights because we were blindfolded. We held onto each others shoulders and walked all the way across the pond. We did not even realize this because we were blindfolded. Eventually, we took our blindfolds off and layed on the grass. We observed and watched the stars for a good twenty minutes. After seeing three shooting stars we headed inside. It was magical.

After showering and getting ready for bed, Mr. Woolner read us a pirate story. I was so tired that I was practically falling asleep so I did not get to hear the ending of the story. Finally, we headed up to bed, and the teachers came in and gave us candy. My friends and I talked for about fifteen minutes, then we drifted off to sleep. We knew we had a big day of hiking the next day. It truly was a terrific first day at Mount Cardigan.
Day 1 at Cardigan by CS is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.