By Nancy Dorrans
People keep asking me about my travel business. Is business picking up? Where is your first trip going to be? What is a vax-i-ca-tion? Why do we need to get tested to come back to this country if we’re already vaccinated? What about Canada? Are you going back to work as a dedicated substitute in the Fall? What else is going on?
My business is starting to wake up and like a bear from hibernation it is a bit groggy. My first trips are going to be local. I’ve already driven to Ohio and back via Rhode Island on a VFF tour. According to Sage Publications, “Visiting family and friends (VFF) tourism, also called visiting friends and relatives tourism, is the practice of traveling to familiar or unfamiliar places for the purpose of meeting people who are personally esteemed or valued. VFF is considered to be among the oldest manifestations of travel.”
What is a vax-i-ca-tion?
A vax-i-ca-tion is the first trip you take after you’ve been fully vaccinated. Our CDC is still advising against international travel. Canada’s government said vaccinated US citizens would be able to enter on August 9th. As of July 22nd, the White House had yet to commit.
While many of us are eager to get traveling again, I’m finding cautious optimism with my clients. One good sign is that the 10% “risk hold” on my merchant account sales has been released! Not that there was much business coming in since March of 2020, but they are betting that my business is staying alive! So am I. And yes, the plan is to head back to Deering High School as a dedicated substitute in the fall.
What else? Bring on August!! My garden is bursting, live music is wafting, and outside is safest. It’s also where I prefer to be wehther for dining, cycling, swimming, paddling, or especially hiking. This summer I’ve even completed my quest to summit the highest mountains of Maine! Yes, life’s good here!!
Part 1 of 2: A twenty-year quest to hike all fourteen of the Maine 4000 footers!
I met my Canadian friend Will Home, also known as “William the Good,” while skiing at Sugarloaf in 2001. It was my first winter in Maine after moving from northern New Hampshire. That spring, my friends from New Hampshire came over to ski with me at Reggae Fest and Will, a friend of my friends and regular at the Widow’s Walk in Stratton, joined our posse. With two big late season storms, the skiing was so good we didn’t stop to hear the music.
Like so many of his neighbors in Quebec, Will came to Maine for a week that summer to hang out on Old Orchard Beach. I joined him one evening for fried clams and pier fries and we planned to go hiking over Labor Day around Sugarloaf. He said, “We should hike the Bigelows!” Thus began my slow (twenty-year) quest to hike all fourteen of the Maine 4000 footers!
Where the 4000 footers are…
These fourteen mountains are spread out in four different mountain ranges in Maine. Three of the highest are in Baxter State Park. The High Peaks range in Franklin County has eight peaks and 32.2 miles of the Appalachian Trail! The Bigelow Range has two peaks. Old Speck comes in as the fourth highest and is the only 4000-footer in the Mahoosuc Range, a northern extension of the Eastern White Mountains.
Hiking with Will was like hiking with a puppy. He kept running ahead and then back to check on me over and over, while I huffed along. We went up the Fire Wardens trail to summit Avery Peak and Bigelow West Peak. It was a cool clear bluebird sky Labor Day with stunning 360-degree views. The loop over to Horns Pond and down part of the Appalachian Trail is about twelve miles. “William the Good” skier and hiking partner probably hiked almost twice that!
Old Speck came next in 2004. I wasn’t in a hurry to get my Maine peaks. Many of my friends in the Maine Outdoor Adventure Club (moac.org) were on a mission to hike the 48 4000-footers in New Hampshire. I was working on that list, too.
My first time up to Baxter State Park was in 2005, with a small group at Kidney Pond cabins. Eight of us made the plan to hike up Baxter Peak. We inched up Abol Slide and at the summit split into two groups. One group of more serious peak baggers went to “get” Hamlin Peak and four of us ventured out over the Knife Edge.
Stay tuned for the more of this story and the rest of my quest in the September print edition of The West End News and online at thewestendnews.com.
Nancy Dorrans is currently working as a Dedicated (in school) Substitute Teacher at Deering High School. She figured she could do something meaningful while we wait for travel to be safe again.
