Firefly Camping

Between September 13-15th, Keith and I went up to New Hampshire for me to finish the last two 4000+' peaks within the White Mountains.   On Friday, we drove up and stayed on the edge of our friend Sue's property in Bethlehem.  Saturday after a quick breakfast, we drove up to the Unknown Pond Trail head, about an hour north of where we stayed the night before.   Mnt Horn For Mount Cabot, you can either do an out and back on Bunnel Notch Trail to the Kilkenny Ridge or you can turn it into a loop continuing on Kilkenny Ridge until you intersect Unknown Pond trail.  The out and back is about 9 miles while the loop is closer to 11.   We chose to do the loop as the there isn't a view from the summit of Cabot and their is short spur off the loop that allows for summiting Horn Mountain, which has a beautiful 360 degree view.  After about 3.5 hours, we completed the day and headed out for lunch before working our way to Moose Brook State park for nig...

Our next two trips brought us out of state and back to a few places we have enjoyed in the past.  Trip 16 included two nights along Little River in Bethlehem, NH on the edge of our friend Sue's property.  This trip has turned into an annual trip with our friends Erin and Kevin and their four daughters.   The trip started with Neil and I heading up a little early and hiking Mnt Pemigewasset and then the next day I climbed Mnt Waumbek, my 46th of the NH 48 4000' peaks. Trip 17 brought us back to George Washington State Park in Glocester, RI.  Not only did we camp their last year as well, but we had the exact same camp site (my lucky number 9).   We got down their early Saturday morning and did some fishing and swimming before heading out to meet up with the in laws for an early dinner and trip out to see their boat (they retired to their boat, a 38' Cabo Rico a few years ago). 

Our next two trips brought us to Lake Denison (Winchendon, MA) and Pearl Hill (West Townsend, MA), both state parks in Massachusetts.  We stayed at Lake Denison on July 4th (Thursday) and 5th (Friday).  The campground is divided into a North and South Side with about a mile of road in between them.  There is also a beach at the South End of the lake.  We ended up staying at the north which really wasn't easily accessible to the all the amenities of the park.   Thursday night, we cooked hot dogs on sticks wrapped in dough over the fire.   On Friday, we went for short bike ride on some technical trails and capped the trip off with a stop at the Baldwin Diner with some red velvet pancakes before heading home.   For Pearl Hill, we headed out Saturday morning, July 20th.  We had been to Pearl Hill once before back in 2019 when I was training for the Midstate 100 when I ran there from Wachusett.   Pearl hill is a great little campg...

For our second trip of 2024, we took a few of Neil's friends up to Harold Parker State Park to celebrate his birthday.  We arrived around 6pm on a Friday evening and got setup before we had to wait out an hour of rain.  Post rain we got a fire going, had s'mores, and got a little biking in.  Saturday involved more biking, a little swimming, more fire / s'mores before we headed home around 3pm, when it really started to pour.  - Scot    

Trip 12, our first trip of 2024, was a road trip that culminated with a visit to Shenandoah National Park during school vacation week.  This was the first big road trip with the new van and were eager to see how it all would go.   Day 1 We left our home in Massachusetts around 9:30, Friday, and began our drive south.  Our overly ambitious goal for day 1 was to make it down to Susquehanna State Park in Maryland which was 372 miles away. With the rain and traffic, we ended up calling an audible and stayed at the Liberty Harbor RV Park in Jersey City instead (just on the other side of the Holland tunnel).   This ended up being a blessing in disguise as it was really cool staying just outside of NYC with great views of the Empire State building and the Statue of Liberty, things my children had only seen in text books.  The other thing we learned here is that don't be overly ambitious on day 1.  The kids need to ease their way into it are more motiva...

Trip 11 (Night 15) for the year took us to the middle of Cape Cod for the Ocean Cup soccer tournament that Neil's club team played in on Indigenous People's Day weekend. The tournament consisted of a game Saturday, 2 Sunday, a play in final on Monday.   We headed down to Harwich shortly after lunch on Saturday and were greeted with off and on downpours on route.  After a quick check in at the Shady Knoll Campground , we headed directly to the field.  The first game was a wet one.  Neil scored his first goal of the season and his team finished the game with a 4-4 tie.  The wet field made it a bit unpredictable.  Next up, we headed to the Hot Stove , and old school sports pub, for dinner, a place we hadn't been to since before the kids were born.  We made it back to the campground shortly after 8pm.  The next morning, I met Lisa, who was also in the Cape for a soccer tournament, for a run.  Our first game wasn't until 2pm so we had plenty ...

Every year since 2016 (minus the pandemic year of 2020) we have participated in the Coast to Cure NF charity bike event (and run, at least for me) in honor of our son Nat who has Neurofibromatosis. It is one of the main fundraisers for NF Northeast and is sort of a homecoming every year where we see our NF family.  Living with NF can be tough as the range issues associated with it can vary so wildly.  Being involved with an organization like NF Northeast really is life saver.  They provide a phenomenal support network and are behind major innovations in the drive to cure and get better treatment for those suffering from NF.   This year our friends Becca and Joe came to the bike ride as well.  Becca biked 70 miles for the first time while Joe got in a 4 mile run followed by a 24 mile bike ride.    Amy and the kids ran a rest stop on the 66 mile ride and I ran 27 miles.  We camped up at the Cape Ann Campsite both Friday and Saturday night....