To The Chin

I'm going to start by saying that parts of this story could be entirely false. I distinctly remember how the story ends but not so much how it began. This happened 20 years ago, I don't remember everything.

In middle school, at the end of the year, we got to choose from a list of day trips to go on. In the sixth grade I chose to go hiking. In the seventh grade I played nine holes of golf, and in the eighth grade all of us had an end of middle school party at Quarry Hill. I'm not sure what the other choices were: going to the mall, seeing a movie, visiting a museum? I have no idea; it never entered my mind. There's no way in hell that I would've chosen to spend the day indoors; I chose hiking.

The trip was to hike Mount Mansfield. Nick and I were excited at the chance to go on the trip together, despite being in different grades. Neither of us had ever hiked a real mountain before. I do not count Mount Philo.

Being 11 years old, I don't know that I had any idea what hiking a mountain would entail. I'm not sure what I thought the trail would look like. I didn’t know how much distance we would cover, how long it would take, or what the top of the mountain would look like. I am sure that I was excited about it.

Our day started at the Underhill State Park. I'm not sure how large the group was, maybe 50 kids, each toting a backpack full of snacks and extra clothing. Here's what I know: we were to take the Sunset Ridge Trail down the mountain, we started at the Underhill State Park, and we took the Long Trail to the summit at Mansfield’s Chin. But I am confused: we did not take the Sunset Ridge Trail up the mountain, but I find it hard to believe that we could have taken a route so long as the CCC Road to the Maple Ridge Trail (5.4 miles to the chin) or so difficult as most of the other options. It might need to remain a mystery but nonetheless it's not so important to the story.

A short while into the hike, Nick and I found ourselves moving slowly with the group, when a few of our friends casually stopped and opened their backpacks. We paused with them, sat on a rock, and laughed at our undoubtedly idiotic middle-school jokes. A short time later, most of the group stopped again, but a few of us didn’t. I wasn’t tired or especially hungry, and it didn't seem that stopping was either necessary or particularly enjoyable. We knew where we were going and so we pushed on to the front of the pack and continued up the trail. Soon we were forging ahead and pausing to let the group catch us.

It was a warm, sunny, early summer day, and as will happen, sections of the trail distinctly resembled free-flowing streams. We hopped and jumped around the water as best we could but I'm certain my sneakers were soaked by days end. One of the chaperones called ahead to ask us, (tell us) to slow down; she needed to keep an eye on all of us and we were making that very difficult. Of course in the excitement of hiking our first mountain, (we were really just kicking everyone else's asses) we continued to move and soon became separated from the group.

There were three of us: Nick, myself, and our friend Will.

We were told from the beginning that we would be returning to the Underhill State Park via the Sunset Ridge Trail. Although this was our first time experiencing it, we were told that we would know the Long Trail by its white hash-marks on the rocks and trees. We weren't sure what sort of marks might be on the Sunset Ridge Trail, but surely we would see the sign. Anyhow, we weren't worried about that; we’d reach the summit and wait for the rest of the group.

So we forged ahead, reached our connection with the Long Trail, and headed north across the mountain’s rocky face towards Mansfield’s Chin. We continued to look behind us for the rest of our group, stopping every now and again to wait and wonder where they were. Should we wait here? Where are they? They will meet us at the top. Let's go. And so we continued our march and soon found ourselves at the windy, cloud-covered chin of Mount Mansfield.

This is where the story gets interesting.

The three of us waited there for any sign of our group. The plan from the beginning was to hike to the summit. We were at the summit. All we had to do was wait for everyone else, right? Well, we waited and we discussed and we thought out loud, and truly we didn't know what to do. As time passed we gave more and more thought to continuing our hike down the Sunset Ridge Trail and making our way back to the bus at Underhill State Park. How long should we wait? Should we go back the way we came and meet up with the group? Why aren't they here yet?
After a long period of waiting and debating, and truly never giving much thought to the consequences of our actions, we decided to continue towards the Sunset Ridge Trail so that we could meet up with the group back at our starting point. All's well that ends well, right? That was our thinking anyway.

The trouble was, we'd already passed the Sunset Ridge Trail. We would’ve had to go back from where we came, south that is, to meet up with the correct trail. In our excitement, or possibly because we were literally in a cloud, we didn't see the sign for the Sunset Ridge Trail on our way to the summit. Now that I think about it, I don't think we were looking for it before reaching the summit. And having not yet come across it, we thought we had to continue north on the Long Trail.

We were wrong.

Heading north on the Long Trail from the chin brings hikers down the Stowe (east) side of the mountain, sending us in the opposite direction of where we needed to be. However we were middle school kids and we were headed downhill. That seemed like a good thing to us; we had to be heading in the right direction.

As more and more time passed and we still hadn’t seen any Sunset Ridge Trail, we were getting concerned. But heading downhill still seemed like the right move and how did we know that it wasn't still in front of us?

It wasn't still in front of us. It was on the other side of the mountain; the west side, the sunset side.

Before we knew it we were at the trailhead at Route 108.

Crap, uhh, we made a mistake.

The three of us looked around for a minute and wondered where the hell we were. About 30 yards up the road north of us, there was a group sitting on the grass at the roadside, with a passenger van parked nearby. One of the group’s leaders immediately saw three kids poke out of the woods and approached us. Stranger danger came into my mind but he looked like a nice guy. We were however conflicted. We could hike back up the trail and make our way back to the group. We had descended the mountain very quickly; we could make it back up quickly. The stranger talked us out of it. His was a hiking club of twentysomethings (or teenagers, who knows?) from out-of-state someplace that had come to the notch in a fifteen-passenger van. After telling him where we began our hike and where we should have ended up he offered, no, implored us to take, a ride back to Underhill.

The stranger (hiking expert and authority figure) made it clear to us that the only way we were going to make it back to the Underhill State Park was in his van. He sounds creepy I know, (I don’t remember any mustache) but he was right. And so after a bit of convincing we accepted his offer and headed up the road in the van.

I don't remember much about the ride. I think the three of us were contemplating how much shit we were in, like little kids waiting for daddy to get home and administer the punishment. Thing is, none of us had ever been in much trouble before. It wasn't as if this was another in a long line of juvenile troublemaking activity for any of us. As an eleven year old at school even I was a poster boy for the quiet, no hassle student. This was probably the first time any of us had a major transgression with authority outside the home.

I assume the van took us up through the notch to Cambridge and back down Route 15, but I can't be sure. I didn't know the roads, I wasn't paying any attention, and frankly he could've been taking us anywhere at all and none of us would've known. Fortunately that was not the case, and what seemed like a short drive was soon over as we pulled up alongside the school bus at Underhill State Park.

We got back safe; that's the most important thing. Is a phrase we heard from exactly no one. We got chewed out pretty bad. I didn't even know the woman doing the chewing, but oh boy was she upset. Beyond the intensity of the verbal tongue lashing, I remember that some of the other kids were around and able to hear every word.

As I said, we weren't the type of kids that were accustomed to getting disciplined by authority figures. Looking back, the phrase “Chill the fuck out” and “We are sixth and seventh graders, give us a freaking break”, come to mind. I'm not sure whether she treated us too much like little kids or too much like adults. Perhaps high-volume screaming was not the answer either way.

The bus ride home was full of quiet gossiping over our new misadventure. I'm sure my parents got a phone call but I don't remember any resulting discussion or discipline. We were likely told “Thank God you’re okay. Don't do that again,” and the book was closed on the issue.

I'd like to say that our exceedingly brave, rebellious adventure turned the three of us into legends in the halls of Frederick H. Tuttle Middle School. It didn’t.

Oh yeah, one more thing, turns out the rest of the group never made it to the summit.