My Sweet Things

Hello Friends! I have missed you! I have been away from writing for a few weeks but I have been keeping up reading all your lovely blogs and adventures! Speaking of adventures, I want to share my new adventure. I joined a wonderful women’s hiking group in April and I have completed two hikes with the wonderful, amazing, Trail Dames! Trail Dames is a hiking group started by the lovely Anna Huthmaker. I was looking to join a club of sorts where I could meet new friends that share common interests. One trip to Google and I found a site called Meetup. Meetup is a site where you type in your interests and your zip code and they pull up hundreds of different groups to join. I enjoy the outdoors and love hiking so when I found Trail Dames I was super excited! I read their bio and recognized Anna! My older son attended Violin lessons at her Violin shop Huthmaker’s. On hike days we meet up at Huthmaker’s to gather, sign in and carpool. The shop is 5 minutes from my house so perfect! This was meant to be.

On April 18th, I met the Dames, signed in and hopped in car with three lovely ladies that I had never met and started out on a 2 hour drive to the trail. When we stopped at Starbucks I knew this was a good thing for me! My first hike with the Trail Dames was to Springer Mountain and we climbed up to the Southern terminus of the Appalachian Trail. The climb itself was .9 miles up and back down. Not a long distance but so fun and so beautiful! This hike was an anniversary hike for the Dames celebrating their 3rd Birthday. Springer Mountain was the first hike for the group so every year they go back there to celebrate. Celebrate we did! We popped the Champagne and had chocolate, and strawberries when we reached the top of the mountain. Really! How awesome is that?!

On the road!

Getting out our gear.

The Appalachian Trail goes all the way to Maine! 2,160 miles!

The trail starts at Springer Mountain and ends in Katahdin, Maine.

Pretty flowers in bloom.

Rocky Trail. Trekking poles really help and I highly recommend using them!

Hello Butterfly!

On the trail I carried my Canon 40D and with my 24-70 lens. It was a bit heavy but not so bad and I was glad to have it.

Dames on the Trail.

View from the top!

Champagne!

Strawberries and Chocolate!

Cheers!

Dames enjoying the great company and the view!

This is Sterling. He started the trail and is hiking solo all the way to Maine! He was so kind to take a group photo with all our cameras!

Trail Dames! This photo is from April’s camera posted on the Trail Dames Meetup site.

Happy Birthday Trail Dames! Yes, we had cake after we walked back down to the bottom of trail. Sweet! Just for the record. They usually do not have cake, champagne, chocolate and strawberries on every hike. I did ask!

So Happy to be a Trail Dame!

It’s all good. ~ Donna